


Allusions To (my love for you)

by Cinnamonbookworm



Series: perfectly perfect [2]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Comfort, F/M, barry and felicity friendship, barry is sad, canon divergence in some chapters, everybody is sad, felicity is sad, kind of wonky timeline so bare with me, updates after both episodes air each week
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-16
Updated: 2015-05-16
Packaged: 2018-03-07 21:05:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 45,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3183149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cinnamonbookworm/pseuds/Cinnamonbookworm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>al·lu·sion /əˈlo͞oZHən/ | noun | an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference.<br/>Felicity Smoak and Barry Allen are hopelessly in love. And everybody knows it.<br/>Just not with each other.<br/>There's a lot of pain that goes with them being in love with Iris West and Oliver Queen<br/><i>Chapter 4: Deus Ex Machina: Barry helps Felicity clean up whats left of her life post 3x12 <i></i></i><br/><i>Chapter 14: Let the Cat Out of the Bag: Barry Allen and Felicity Smoak are hopelessly in love. And everybody knows it. Just not with each other. They probably wouldn't be as happy as they are right now if they were in love with each other. {post 1x22 and 3x23} <i></i></i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sound and Fury

**Author's Note:**

> al·lu·sion /əˈlo͞oZHən/  
> noun  
> an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference.
> 
> And then is heard no more. It is a tale  
> Told by an idiot, full of **sound and fury ******,
> 
> Signifying nothing.  
> -Shakespeare’s Macbeth

Felicity Smoak and Barry Allen are hopelessly in love. And everybody knows it.

Just not with each other.

It would be a lot less painful if they were in love with each other, that's for certain.

(If he was in love with each her, he would have called her after he got out of that coma. After he saw Iris and Joe, of course, but he would’ve called her nonetheless).

(If she was in love with him, she would’ve said no to Oliver when he asked her out. To be fair, though, if she was in love with Barry then, she doubted Oliver would’ve asked her out in the first place).

(If they were in love with each other, Barry would have asked her out that night on the train).

(If they were in love with each other, that kiss would have gone on a lot longer).

(If they were in love with each other, Felicity would not have tried to latch on to Ray Palmer to keep her from falling into her emotions).

(And Barry wouldn’t have beaten up Eddie. Iris wouldn’t have lost her faith in the Flash. Barry would not be in the position he is now where they tiptoe around each other and barely speak).

(Barry wouldn’t have lost the love of his life).

Sometimes Barry wishes he had fallen in love with Felicity.

The problem, though, is that it wouldn’t have changed anything for her.

(Her being in love with him would not have saved Moira Queen).

(Her being in love with him would not have kept Thea out of Malcolm Merlyn’s reach).

(Her being in love with him would not have kept Thea from murdering Canary).

(Her being in love with him would not have kept Oliver from going to fight on that mountain).

(Her being in love with him would not have left Oliver alive).

And there stands the fault in his wishes, because if they had been in love with each other, Felicity still would’ve lost her best friend. She still would be broken and crying on the ground like she is now.

But at least her last memories of Oliver wouldn’t be him telling her that he feels the same as her. Without ifs, or maybes or buts or somedays. Just like she had wanted back before she had clung to Barry and Ray as lifelines in a frail attempt to keep herself from drowning in her love for the man who refused to allow himself to love her back.

But at least she might let someone in through the locked door she was now sitting behind. She might answer when he called inside with something other than heavy breaths and sobs.

(Not that Barry was doing much better himself).

Oliver Queen may not have been the great love of his life, but he was his mentor and his friend and someone he looked up to a lot. He is feeling the loss heavily, despite what his super healing would have the average onlooker believe.

He tripped three times the other day while running to save someone in a burning building. Nearly broke his ankle the first two and actually did the third time. Still, he managed to limp his way through the flames and save the person inside.

Because that’s what Oliver would have done.

Oliver, without superpowers or quick healing, who would continue his crusade after being gravely injured, who would somehow survive after everything.

Except, apparently, a sword in the chest.

Oliver would have saved these people.

No matter what.

The best way to honor his memory is to become a better, faster Flash.

And to comfort Felicity.

(If only she’d let him).

But she doesn’t seem to want to talk about anything at all. It doesn’t seem like she can talk about anything at all. So instead, he tells her about his Christmas, and the sobs slowly start to stop, and eventually he gets to the topic of Iris.

He doesn’t think he can tell Felicity that Iris knows now (not that he’s the Flash, just that he has always been in love with her) (he wishes it was Felicity instead) (that might make it easier on the both of them). So instead, he just tells her all about Iris.

He tells her about the way Iris smells like lavender in the morning and coffee after work. He tells her about how sometimes they would stay up all night talking back when they were in high school. He tells her about Junior Prom and the way Iris looked in that crimson dress and how he almost told her he loved her but then her date _finally_ showed up.

He tells her about all her little quirks. And how he loves them all.

The first sentence he hears from her all day nearly makes him jump, because he’s rambling on and on (he could go on about Iris forever), and he hasn’t had anyone around to cut him off for a while.

“I have this habit…” Felicity starts, her voice quaky and full of the sadness that she’s drowning in. “where I chew on pens. I was chewing on one when I first-”

She needs to take a deep breath just so she can keep going.

“when he first walked in through the door of my office. He told me later that he… remembered it. Down to the color. It was red.”

“Maybe that’s how you know you love someone.” Barry responds softly. “When you find that you remember specific details of moments that shouldn’t matter to you but do anyway.”

“Maybe.”

They sit there together, still on opposite sides of the door, and, for the first time since he got there, everything is silent.

Felicity breaks it. “Why don’t you have any stories about Iris after Christmas?”

He can’t avoid it anymore.

“Things… aren’t what they used to be…”

“What happened Barry?”

“It doesn’t matter. You’re the one who needs me right now, not the other way around.”

“No - talk; somehow its hard to cry when you’re talking to me. This is the longest break I’ve had from tears since I…”

“I know.”

“Did you guys have a fight?”  
“I wish we had…. I kind of told her.”

“That you’re the Flash?”

“She probably would’ve taken that better.”

There is quiet from the other side as Felicity begins to understand what he means when he says he told her. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“At least you still have her around.”

“At least he loved you back.”

She chokes back a sob, and Barry regrets saying what he had. “I’m sorry, Felicity. I swear I didn’t mean it. My situation isn’t nearly as bad as yours. Forget I said anything.”

“Its okay Barry. Heartbreak is heartbreak. Just because Iris isn’t… You don’t have to pretend you’re doing fine for my benefit.”

“But you’re right. I don’t know what I’d do if I… if I were in your position.”

“It’s its own unique kind of torture.” She replies bitterly. And then she lets out a laugh that doesn’t sound right, and it matches her tone. “Its funny, you know. Before I met him, I had my life all planned out, but now that…”

“Felicity, you don’t have to…”

She tramples right over the end of his sentence with some awful determination to face the facts that Oliver Queen is dead. “Now that he’s gone, I don’t know what I’m going to do with my life.”

“Felicity-” He doesn’t know how to comfort her. He’s been there before, with a loved one dead, and no one really helping. “If we’re going to keep talking, at least let me come in so we can get you cleaned up.”

Begrudgingly, she opens the door.

.

.

.

Felicity knows she looks like hell. She hasn’t showered in days and she’s been binging a little heavily on the mocha ice cream. Not to mention, the circles under her eyes are the color of charcoal, because she hasn’t been sleeping well. She blames the nightmares.

In the nightmares, she’s right there beside him.

In the nightmares, she watches him get stabbed with the sword that Malcolm Merlyn placed on the table in front of her.

In the nightmares, she watches him fall.

She definitely should not have done a search to find the mountain he was killed on.

But at least in the nightmares she can hear his voice again.

There was one particularly memorable just the other night where she dreamed that he came back and she kissed him and it felt so real. But then he was stabbed through the back and it pierced inside of her and she could’ve sworn she was dying right along with him. (She might as well have) (It’s not like what she’s been doing for the past few days has exactly been living) She doesn’t dare shut her eyes after that.

But, she opens the door anyway, because its _Barry_. Because he came all the way from Central City just to talk to her. Because he didn’t go away after she told him to and instead sat down on the other side of the door and regaled her with stories of the great love of his life (who at least is alive) (even if she doesn’t love him back) (she will someday) (how can anyone not love Barry?) (except for her herself) (but that’s mostly because the one great love of her life is-)

Even her thoughts can’t process what has happened.

Even her thoughts, which move just as fast as Barry does at top speed, stop whenever she thinks about what happened on that mountain.

But, as Barry has assured her, she isn’t the only one who is tripping up whenever Oliver Queen crosses their mind.

 

Barry is still in his Flash suit. (Of course he is) (she can’t have expected him to run over in his normal clothes) (they would have caught on fire) (just like her shirt did that one time). However, he seems to have had the decency to lower his mask and put a hoodie on over the suit, just in case any passers-by happened to see him sitting outside her door.

(It would probably be tough to explain to Iris West why the Flash was sitting outside her bedroom door consoling her over the Arrow’s…) (bottom line: her life was too complicated for her to fully handle). His eyes are full of the same sadness that she’s been seeing in her own for days now, and she’s not sure whether letting him in is a good idea or not. Her apartment may not be able to handle twice the amount of grief.

“I brought you Game of Thrones, Doctor Who, and Pscyh.” He holds up three DVDs in his left hand, and she is almost tempted to smile. “I wasn’t sure which one you would want to watch. I mean, I knew you mentioned liking all of them, but you never really know with situations like this. I figured you might not want to talk right now and just be distracted, and I know watching tv shows is a good distracting and I know you need one and-”

She cuts him off with a hug.

(He’s too good to her) (she doesn’t deserve this)

She is still having a hard time actually comprehending what is happening, so she plays pretend, like she did when her father left, and when Cooper went to jail. She pretends that she is crying because of some other reason, some other, silly not-life-shattering reason. She pretends that Barry is her too-good-for-her boyfriend who has come over to cheer her up.

It is easier that way.

Keeps her from facing reality.

She really does not want to face reality more than she has to. (She already does every time she closes her eyes).

She wishes that second reality was true.

She wishes that her tears and cries and screams were nothing but sound and fury and that she had no real reason to be upset.

She wishes she was in love with Barry and not Oliver.

She wishes she lived in a normal world where there was no Arrow and no Flash and no whatever-the-hell-Ray-is-trying-to-do.

(She might even take Game of Thrones over what she’s feeling right now) (Although in that universe Oliver would probably still be-)

“No Game of Thrones today.” She tells Barry as they make their way over to her couch, which is covered in quilts and slightly spattered with stains from ice cream and coffee and soup. (And tears, all the tears).

“So which is it then, Doctor Who or Psych?”

“Let’s do Psych.”

“Wanting to laugh, then?”

“I could use one… Just no Right Turn or Left for Dead, okay?”

“I don’t think either of us could stomach that episode right now.”

She agrees.

And so they watch together. She does get close to laughing, once. And it’s not even the episode that does that, but Barry himself, who makes some comment about finding a hidden pineapple, and then starts singing a Psych parody of the Sponge Bob theme song. (It’s badly off-key) (but its charming nonetheless) (and it lets her indulge herself in her fantasy that its Barry that she’s in love with and not anybody else). (Especially not Oli-).

Felicity can feel herself tearing up, and so she tries as hard as she can to focus on the episode, see the clues before the camera pans to them and highlights them, trying as hard as she can to keep the tears inside.

But they come out anyway, and she finds herself sobbing into Barry’s shoulder. And he holds her. It feels right, somehow.

(Not as right as the words _I love you_ coming from Oliver’s mouth, though) (not as right as the feel of the Arrow’s lips on hers) (not as right as shoulder touches and red pens between lips and the soft fabric of her date dress against her skin) (but right nonetheless).

And now she’s really in pain, and her breaths are shallow and weak, and she is making the ugliest noises and faces, but he is still holding onto her.

Not too tight though.

She wonders if its because he’s afraid she is going to shatter at any moment.

( _She’s_ afraid she might shatter at any moment).

 

But they hold onto each other, nevertheless, trying not to think about anything but the moment. And, for the moment, they can pretend that they are in love with each other. Her neighbors probably think they’re in love with each other. The average passerby would think they’re in love with each other, but they’re not.

They’re in love with two other people.

And both of them are lost to them for what may be forever.

(They’re not totally sure whether or not they’ve actually given up hope yet).

And they both know that, even if the great true loves of their life are lost to them forever, they won’t end up falling in love with each other.

As Felicity had so eloquently put it, _they’d looked down that road and said no thank you._

But they can pretend, even if its just for now, because there’s no harm in finding solace in each other, just as long as one foot stays planted in reality.

(Right now the sadness that they’re trying to get away from is what's keeping them grounded).

“Moments like this it almost feels like we’re a real couple.” Felicity finally manages to whisper out.

“In another universe, maybe. Any other universe and we’d realize we were perfect for each other.”

“Perfectly perfect.”

But there’s a reason two similar pieces of a puzzle don’t fit together.

(But they can pretend) (at least for now).


	2. Crossing the Rubicon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crossing the Rubicon  
> to do something that inevitably commits one to following a certain course of action  
> to make a fateful or final decision  
> {Alludes to the crossing of the River Rubicon by Julius Caesar with his army, which involved him in a civil war in B.C. 49.}

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so as you all may have inevitably noticed… there was a time jump in the flash of a month and a time jump in arrow of four days. i am going to assume that arrow’s 3x09 took place around Christmas because of Oliver and Thea’s scene in front of the tree. therefore, if spoilers are correct and Team Arrow really isn’t going to know that Oliver’s alive until 3x15 (in about a month), I am going to say that last week’s chapter takes place sometime between Arrow’s 3x10 and the Flash’s 1x10.  
> (what i’m saying is that i’m going to keep this in the canon universe until proven wrong)  
> (and yes i know grant gustin said that barry doesn’t know about oliver)  
> (but he looked so broken in the last Flash episode, and it must’ve been partially about Iris but they couldn’t have kept that secret for a month now, could they?)  
> (probably not seeing as Felicity is now tearing up every time she talks to anyone)  
> So basically Barry does know about a certain hero’s death in this chapter, but because of the warped timelines, the parallels are only going to be highlighted through circumstance, with no actual Barry/Felicity conversation this chapter.  
> Sorry.

Crossing the Rubicon

_to do something that inevitably commits one to following a certain course of action_

_to make a fateful or final decision_

_{Alludes to the crossing of the River Rubicon by Julius Caesar with his army, which involved him in a civil war in B.C. 49.}_

Circumstances have changed.

Because now the Flash is no longer just a rumor for the people. No longer just an urban legend. Now, the Flash is real and good and golden and they caught him on video and a police officer saved his life.

Now, Barry can no longer pretend that he doesn’t believe in the Flash.

Now, he can no longer tell everyone to stop looking into it, especially when he’s all Eddie’s been going on about since the fight against Captain Cold and Heatwave.

Now, he has to tell Iris he was wrong and that he’s sorry about not believing her before, because he’s trying so so hard to piece back together their fractured friendship. (If he’s being honest with himself, it feels like he’s walking on thin ice) (or glass) (or both) (maybe running would be the more appropriate term).

Now, he has to watch as her blog goes back up again, although with a less biased view than before. He has to watch as she makes it clear she does not want to talk to the Flash.

(Despite every other reporter in Central City wanting desperately to get as many interviews as she’s gotten).

She does, however, want to talk to Barry Allen, albeit not as much as she had before he’d let go of his first secret.

(If she’s reacted this way, how is she going to react when she finds out that he _is_ , in fact, the Flash?)

(Maybe he should’ve shared his other secret with her first).

 

Eddie has him doing tests on a skin sample he’d found while investigating the most recent crime scene: where the Flash had prevented the rape of a young woman. Barry had been a bit clueless and careless (he’d probably been distracted by the fact that people were now trying to find him at any and all crime scenes that came up on the news or police radios), and had brushed his cheek up against one of the brick walls of the alleyway while getting her away.

And for the first time in his entire life, Barry had to “accidentally” destroy a valuable piece of evidence.

Now Eddie is disappointed in him.

And so is Iris.

And almost the entire police force, really.

Because he just destroyed a lead on them figuring out who the Flash is. (He really can’t believe that no one is suspecting him already just because he’s not as excited as they are and come on, since when does Barry Allen accidentally destroy evidence?)

And, of course, Dr. Wells is disappointed in him because not only is he saving people again instead of training to beat the Reverse Flash, he’s being careless.

So by that extent, Caitlin is too.

And Cisco.

And Joe.

(He wonders who wouldn’t be disappointed in him). (Oliver wouldn’t be disappointed in him, or anyone in Team Arrow, for that matter). (Oliver has literally been arrested for being the Arrow and somehow got out of that). (He wouldn’t care, just as long as the girl was safe). (Sometimes he wishes he worked with them for a change). (The laughs wouldn’t happen quite as much, though).

(They barely laugh at all anymore).

(And if he’s being honest he’d rather stay in Central City where everyone is disappointed in him than face the reality every day that Oliver Queen is dead)

Sometimes, Barry notes when he walks into Jitters to check up on Iris, there is a crowd gathered outside of the coffee shop, all wearing red, and sometimes with signs saying “We Believe, Do You?” and “He’s There And Gone In A Flash,” and other things along those lines.

Some days it makes him smile.

Some days it does not.

Those are the days when things are particularly bad with Iris, when they jump back whenever one of them even so much as touches the other, and they can barely look each other in the eye. Those kinds of days, he so does not want to be reminded that there’s still another secret that he’s keeping from her. (And this time, she might not forgive him so easily). (Eddie would forgive him for this one though). (Funny how these kinds of things work out).

The days they make him smile are the days when they make Iris smile. And its mostly because she finally believes in the Flash again. She finally has hope that he will come when someone is in trouble again. (Although she doesn’t seem too keen on any more rooftop visits).

He really should be training to outrun the Reverse Flash. And he does, most days, deciding who needs his help more on a case-by-case basis. However, the days when he sees Iris smile at what he’s been doing as the Flash make him putting off his training worth it.

Sometimes he wants to show up on the rooftop of Jitters even when Iris isn’t there just in case one of his many fans sees him up there and submits something to Iris’ blog about it.

(He really really misses those days where they would flirt with each other with none of this space separating them). (Well, there was a giant secret, a red mask, and a disfigured face and voice, but that’s beside the point).

(He just hopes Iris misses those days too).

There are occasions, however, when he’ll catch her staring up at the rooftop with a sad and wistful sort of smile.

Those are the kind of days where he wants to go up there the most.

But he doesn’t.

Because he needs to train and work hard and save people, because the sooner Iris forgives the Flash, the sooner she will have fully forgiven Barry. And the sooner he can even begin to think about telling her his second secret again.

Because the circumstances may have changed, but his feelings are still the same, and he’s going to have to think long and hard about his decisions before he crosses the Rubicon again.

.

.

.

The circumstances have changed. As much as Felicity would have had them not.

Denial is a very powerful tool, and she used it for as long as she could. (She held out less than a week). (To be fair, though, she’s always had a hard time denying cold hard fact). (And a 99.997 match is cold hard fact) (as much as she wishes it wasn’t).

_He’ll be back._

_He’s not dead._

_When he comes back…_

The whens and wills and other definites slowly crumbled away in front of her, like sand, turning into ifs and maybes and all those other non-committal answers that had forced Oliver Queen’s last words to be what they had.

(If only he hadn’t been so stubborn).

(And she’s not sure when she thinks this whether or not she’s talking about him being stubborn and going to face Ra’s al Ghul or him being stubborn and saying they can’t be together) (either way, something in the past few months would be different)

(Maybe he would be alive)

(Or maybe he could’ve at least died knowing she loved him back).

What is definitely not helping is the look that Laurel shoots her, like she understands, because she doesn’t. At least she had anger at him to get her through those five years. Anger at Oliver and Sara because _maybe they deserved it._

Felicity does not have that kind of anger.

She has anger, alright, anger at Malcolm Merlyn and Ra’s al Ghul and Nyssa and Oliver and even Thea a little bit for ever trusting Merlyn. But she’s mostly angry at herself.

At least she’s not in denial anymore.

(She wishes she was). (It was a lot less painful when she was). (She wishes it had been Oliver in the lair instead of Malcolm Merlyn).

And, for the first time since Oliver Queen first walked into her office, she doesn’t know what to do.

Because there is no way she is going back into the used-to-be-Arrow-cave (it doesn’t feel right calling it that when the Arrow himself is..). And there is no way she is joining Ray in his crusade. (She can’t watch another person she loves die for her). (But at least she’s told Ray and Roy and Diggle what they mean to her). (At least they’ll get a bit more closure from her when they inevitably decide to sacrifice themselves for the good of the city).

( _She can’t even think of the possibility of them doing this without choking up_ ).

There’s constant pain in her throat from holding back tears.

Its the kind of pain that feels like there’s a boa constrictor inside of her windpipe who is somehow suffocating her.

Its the kind of pain she’s only felt a once before, and never in this magnitude.

When her father left.

She did not get this choked up when she thought cooper died.

She did not get this choked up when Barry Allen was struck by lightning.

She did not get this choked up when Sara Lance was murdered by Thea Queen. (Which is really the whole reason why she is this choked up in the first place).

There is a knock at the door at midnight.

Then her phone rings.

All of them come to her door at one point or another over the course of a week.

But she does not open up.

Because the one person who she would open up the door for is not coming back. He’s never going to knock on her door again.

So what’s even the point.

She has crossed over to a new state of mind somewhere in between the blood sample coming up and her locking herself in her apartment.

The only thing is that she’s not sure if she crossed the Rubicon when she admitted he was dead or when she walked out of the Foundry.

Maybe it was when she told Ray she didn’t want him to commit suicide by going out there and trying to save the city.

Maybe it was when the boa constrictor inside her throat warned her that if she didn’t cry soon (like really really sob, with heavy shaking breathing and everything), she was going to suffocate.

(At least then she might see him again).

 

She does her work for Palmer Technologies from her home computer.

She eats all the food in her fridge before calling to order a pizza, because she doesn’t know if she’ll stay in one piece long enough to have a coherent conversation with another actual human being.

Even her thoughts, which used to move at a million miles an hour (almost as fast as the Flash himself), are now jumbled and slow and confusing if they even come out at all.

She barely speaks.

She barely eats.

She barely drinks anything.

She doesn’t continue to dye her hair, not even having the courage and energy to cancel her appointment.

When she looks in the mirror, she no longer recognizes herself, just a ghost of the former bubbly, bright, blonde optimist that came into the world in the wake of the supposed death of Cooper Seldon, and who has subsequently disappeared from it in the wake of the death of Oliver Queen.

(She will learn later that the latter is also supposed).

But for now, the circumstances have changed.

She will not go back to the Foundry.

That, she swears.

Not even if it means missing Laurel Lance become the Black Canary.

She should be upset that another Lance sister is once again being stronger and more capable of handling life than she is.

But the only person whose opinion on the subject would really matter is gone. And he’s not coming back.

(She just wishes he would’ve died knowing that she loves-loved him-too).

(Because the circumstances may have changed, but her feelings have not wavered even an inch).

 


	3. Gordian Knot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Gordian Knot  
>  _the thing with secret identities is that they cause a lot of problems_  
>  _problems which should be able to be solved easily with the truth_  
>  _but that in itself is a Gordian Knot_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Canon Divergence Galore  
> **  
>  So I’m trying something new and starting with Felicity today. Hope none of you mind too much. Also, I’m thinking about making this a drabble collection, and throwing some aus and canon divergences in here, so let me know how you feel about that. Also screw the timeline I’m just going to pretend there wasn’t a time jump in the Flash because Felicity needs a friend. ****

A Gordian Knot

_an extremely complex problem solved in a quick or decisive manner_

_{Alludes to Gordius, ancient king of Phrygia, who tied a knot (the Gordian knot) that, according to prophecy, was to be undone only by the person who was to rule Asia, and that was cut, rather than untied, by Alexander the Great.}_

Oliver has been dead for almost a week now. (She had a nightmare that he didn’t go). (That she kissed him). (And then he started bleeding from his mouth). (That ruined it). (She’s got to stop having vodka before bed). And she’s…. dealing with it.

(By dealing with it, she means she’s gone back to the Arrow cave). (She means not yelling at Ray anymore). (She means drinking coffee black because sweetness and whipped cream and caramel make her think of false hope and broken promises). (She means trying not to look at the silver mannequin that still holds the Arrow suit).

Also, Ray wants to know what she was doing with his helicopter. She really isn’t in the mood to tell him, because to tell him would mean he goes through with his suicide mission. And, while she may now be helping him, she’s not going to encourage him with that. (She needs someone left alive who loves her). (Even if she’d rather have the other one).

Also, Thea is staying in the city, not even remotely aware of the danger that Ra’s al Ghul is to her.

Needless to say, somehow Felicity has somehow found herself with a secret identity (which she kind of wants to reveal). By day, she is the very blonde slightly bubbly Vice President of Palmer Technologies, who likes to wear panda flats and who has her assistant bring her cups of Starbucks coffee on the hour and a half. By night, she is the natural brunette who is mourning a loss large enough to tear an arrow-sized hole in her heart, who can hack any database in a matter of seconds, who can hold her own when training with the Black Canary, and who doesn’t smile or babble quite as much as she used to. The mask she wears is not made of a polymer, but of a smile and a mouthful of fluffy words.

The only problem with this theory is that Felicity Smoak the babbler existed long before Felicity Smoak the mourner did. (She’s almost tempted to dye her hair black again). (But that would be like pulling off her mask).

She tells Ray its a secret. She doesn’t use her fluffy voice with him. He already knows she’s in mourning.

He doesn’t ask again.

Everything only looks right in the world.

.

.

.

Iris has almost seen his phone now. Twice. Maybe he shouldn’t have set the picture of him and Caitlin and Cisco and Wells as his wallpaper (number one rule of having a secret identity and all) but he loves the picture and what it means. Besides, he’s cropped it so that the Flash insignia isn’t shown, and, to the casual observer, it would just look like he’s wearing a red shirt. Iris, however has seen the Flash’s suit up close and personal and she would recognize the top corner of the lightning bolt that just peeks out from the bottom of his screen.

Needless to say, Barry’s nerves have been racing all day, and, coming from him, that’s no hyperbole. It doesn’t help that she’s talking constantly about her boss, and how he really wants her to do an interview of the Flash. Like _really_ wants her to. Like if-you-write-this-Iris-I-can-make-big-things-happen-for-you-Iris-speech wants her to.

“I wish he would just accept that I can’t get an interview with him.” Iris rants, despite Barry knowing that the Flash would be _more than happy_ to talk to her again. “But at the same time, if I do this interview, I’ll be the first person to ever interview someone with superpowers, and thats an opportunity I’m not sure I can pass up.”

(He doesn’t want her to pass it up). (He wants to meet her on the rooftop of Jitters in his red-leather suit and remind her that amazing things still exist). (He wants to leave her breathless only to race off into the wind in a flash of lightning). (He wants-)

“What do you think, Barry?” Iris asks, and he sort of chokes on his coffee, because for a second he thought that she knew what he was thinking.

“Uh, um I think you should only write the article if you think its a good move. I mean, didn’t that Flash guy put Eddie in the hospital? Isn’t that why you stopped visiting him? I don’t want you to get hurt, Iris.”

“He said he’d been hit with that anger thing that affected everyone at the bank or something.” She fires back unexpectedly. The comment would hurt him, if he wasn’t the said possibly-dangerous lightning-fast superhero. Instead, it kind of makes his heart swell.

He should probably also feel guilty because he _knows_ if he pushes Iris _not_ to do something, she’s more likely to do it. He really wants her to do it. _It_ being the interview, not the Flash. Although... and he’s starting to think the way Felicity talks.

Iris narrows her eyes at him slightly. She then attempts to take his phone again. He either needs to put a lock on it or change that picture.

“I promise I won’t do the interview if you let me see your phone.” She teases, and, for a second, everything feels right in the world again.

.

.

.

For the past three years, Felicity has slowly been weaving a large knot of lies. This knot of lies has created the problem she is finding herself in. Ray has just come into her office with that awkward gait of his with a very confused look on his face.

“Felicity, why are their bulletholes in my helicopter?”

Yes, she has created a giant knot of lies. A Gordian Knot, to be exact. And, just like the Gordian Knot, there is a very simple solution. The sword to cut through this knot is the truth. “The sword of truth never did feel sharper.” She mumbles.

Ray hears her. He doesn’t say anything, just contorts his face into an even greater state of dubiety.

(She really wants to cut this Gordian Knot).

(Instead, she changes the subject). (Well, it only seems like that to him).

“Arsenal and the Canary were in the Glades last night.” She starts.

“Felicity I don’t see what this has to do with-”

“I promise, its relevant. Just…” She starts to type away furiously at her keyboard, pulling up security camera footage from last night. Her hands push the screen around to face him. “Watch this.”

And there it is, his helicopter, flying in the air as the Canary (or really Black Canary now) shatters through a pane of glass and lands on top of it.

So she’s not cutting the Gordian Knot with a sword, but more with a butter knife.

She’s hoping he understands.

“They couldn’t leave the Glades unprotected. Neither could I.”

“Wow. Okay. Give me an hour to process this and I will be back.” Ray states, and then walks out of her office.

Bubbly Felicity would kill her.

Mourning Felicity, however, knows that sometimes people need to know your secret identity if you’re going to have one. It’s a pretty lonely existence without someone knowing. Oliver helped show her that. (And now she’s opened up a new can of worms).

She stares at her phone and thinks about calling someone.

.

.

.

This is getting out of hand.

Iris has decided to do the interview with the Flash. Unfortunately, the post she makes to her blog asking the Flash to meet her tonight makes Barry’s phone go ‘ping. Now she wants to see it again. He covers it up by telling her that _of course_ he’s following her blog.

And then his phone _actually_ starts ringing and he nearly drops it, because his nerves are at their end.

(And of course its the one person he hasn’t talked to). (Not since she told him to leave her alone if he was going to continue what she called his “suicide mission.”) (He knows its only because she was hurting) (and that it really meant that she can’t lose him too) (but that doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt).

This time, he lets Iris see his phone. Mostly because she can’t see the picture of him in the Flash suit when Felicity’s caller ID is flashing on the screen. He then goes into a quieter corner to answer the phone.

She doesn’t say hello. She doesn’t say _I was wrong_ or _I’m sorry_ or any of the things that Barry was expecting her to say.

Instead, she says “I’m cutting the Gordian Knot.”

If they were anyone else, the reference might be lost. But they are perfectly perfect for each other, with minds made of the same material. And, because he’s smart enough to get this reference, he should think of a smart thing to say back. But he doesn’t. Instead, he says the exact thing someone would say if they _didn’t_ know what a Gordian Knot was.

“What knot?”

“The one where I keep pretending I don’t know anything about any vigilante-hero people to my friend because I think its doing the opposite of its original goal, which was to keep him from becoming one of these vigilante-hero people.”

“Felicity, I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. Secret identities are secret for a reason.”

“Look, how many times have you wanted to tell Iris that you’re the Flash?” She asks, her voice filled with ten times more energy than the last time they talked. He looks over to where his best friend is still sitting, looking at her phone. (He wants to tell her so bad). (He’s wanted to tell her every day since he became this way). “Well its like that. No. Its not like that. Because I’m not in love with Ray. I think he might be in love with me though, but that’s beside the point. I’m tired of keeping this big of a secret from him. Especially if knowing what happened - what happened to the Arrow could save his life.”

This isn’t the first time that Barry has heard Felicity refer to Oliver as “the Arrow” since the confirmation that he died. In this context, though, it sounds out of place. If Felicity is telling Ray Palmer that she can’t have him risking his life because of the Arrow’s death, she should start with Oliver Queen.

(Because really, he’s heard the story, that’s how it did start).

“Felicity don’t- don’t tell him about the Arrow. Tell him about Oliver Queen. Ray Palmer knows about the Arrow; he’s probably watched news reports about him since he first appeared in Starling City. Knowing a vigilante died isn’t going to stop him. Knowing a person, especially one you cared so much for, died, thats what’s going to make him be more careful. Trust me, I know from experience.”

“Barry I-”

“I know it was the grief talking and not you Felicity. Besides, if I get stabbed I’ll just heal super fast, you don’t need to worry about me.”

“But I do.”

“I know.”

He looks over at Iris again, who will probably be devastated to learn that Oliver Queen is dead. He’s already decided he’s not going to tell her until Felicity lets him know that the Starling City media starts picking up on it. She probably won’t be able to deal with it. (He’s not able to deal with it).

“So this Palmer guy… you like him enough to let him in on your secret night life?”

“I like him. I can’t love him. I don’t think I can love anyone again.” He lets that sit with him. Barry wonders whether or not he can love again after Iris. He doesn’t know if he can either. Felicity tries at a joke, but her voice is strained again, like it was the last time they talked. “Besides, if I could love anyone after Oliver, I would of course love you. Perfectly perfect and all that.”

(Yeah) (perfectly perfect). (Didn’t stop them from loving other people). (Didn’t stop said other people from shattering their hearts into a billion pieces).

(At least he can still talk to Iris).

(At least he’s not talking to a silver mannequin clothed in a green leather suit).

(At least he knows she’s joking).

“Maybe it would be good for you to at least try.”

“Only if you try to be careful.”

“I’ve been careful ever since you called me that first night.”

“Barry, you might want to consider cutting that Gordian Knot of your own. You never know how long you’re going to have with someone in your line of work.”

(It’s not the first time she’s said that either).

He thinks about Iris’ post calling the Flash to meet her tonight. “I’ll consider it.”

.

.

.

Ray comes back an hour later. The confused expression from earlier is gone.

“You work with the vigilantes.”

Felicity neither confirms or denies this.

“When you said you lost people..”

She nods her head.

“The Arrow hasn’t been seen in Starling City since the night you told me you weren’t going to help me.”

Felicity can only stare at him with tears in the corners of her eyes. “Did I ever tell you the story of the day my life changed completely?” She asks him, voice still tight from her phone call with Barry.

Ray shakes his head. “If you had we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“So I’m working in my office down at I.T. you know, the one that Paul works in now. And I’m chewing on this pen, this red pen, when someone walks into my office with a laptop full of bulletholes just like the ones in your helicopter, which, by the way, are not that many, and they ask me to salvage whatever I can from it. And then, a little while later, my boss Walter Steele goes missing. And then the _Starling City Vigilante_ shows up in my car shot and bleeding.”

“I thought you said it was one day that it changed completely. Which of the days was that?”

“The day Oliver Queen handed me a lie and a laptop.”

And then everything changes on Ray’s face. What was once confusion and slight mistrust and empathy is now replaced with total and complete understanding because _how could he not see this before?_ (She really wishes he would’ve realized while Oliver was still alive).

“Last week, someone showed up at our headquarters with a sword drenched to the hilt in his blood. He’s gone now. The Arrow isn’t here to protect our city anymore, and the Canary and Arsenal need all the help they can get.” She begins to stand up out of her swivel chair. “And that, that is why there are bullet holes in your helicopter and that is why I don’t want you going out there and that is why you cannot tell anyone.”

And then she walks out of her office, because, truthfully, she doesn’t know what else to say to him. Also Roy and Diggle and Laurel need her help tracing the location of one of Brick’s left-hand men. (Also its about the time of night for her to drink another five cups of black coffee and brood and stare at the mannequin where Oliver’s Arrow outfit still hangs.

When she reaches the lair, though, she realizes something horrible. The hood is gone.

.

.

.

The Flash meets Iris on the rooftop. Barry’s conversation with Felicity has sobered him up, so the Flash doesn’t race around Jitters and clean everything up, or tease her in the restaurant. He just runs around down there enough for her to notice that he’s there, and then he stands on the roof and faces the city and only turns around when Iris calls the name of his hero-identity.

“Flash.” She starts, her voice less breathless than he remembers from the last time she talked to the Flash. “I wasn’t sure if you would show up.”

“And give up the chance to be interviewed for the news? Not a chance?”

She gives him a tight lipped smile. They don’t talk about him hurting Eddie, or his _what other girls_ comment or anything like that. She asks him questions, and he answers them the best he can without giving away who he is.

But he can’t resist. The words “Gordian Knot” are still circling around in his head. And so he brings himself up. The other him. Not the one that Iris is currently talking to. “After the last time we talked, I looked into the Barry guy that you were talking about.”

“Oh.”

“He got struck by lightning?”

“I don’t see how its any of your business.”

“I’m just saying, I got these powers after the particle accelerator exploded. You might want to check into if he got anything like this.”

Iris’ eyes widen. So yeah, he’s poking the Gordian Knot with the tip of his sword. He’s not cutting it. Not yet.

“And you can’t put that in the news, by the way.” He smiles at her, and suddenly the teasing, flirty personality that he’s adopted as the Flash is back. “See you around Iris.” And then he races off.

(Except he knows she’s kind of breathless again) (and that sort of makes it all worth it).

(And everything is even more right in the world).

He wakes up the next morning smiling.

But then he sees the news about what’s going on in Starling City.

And he can’t believe his eyes. _Because Oliver’s alive?_


	4. Deus Ex Machina

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Deus Ex Machina
> 
>   
> 
> 
> _life is full of **deus ex machinas** , the only problem with them is that they don't solve every problem, in fact, they tend to create them __  
> _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is entirely about Felicity because, lets be real here, the only real Deus Ex Machina moment in the Flash this week was that Iris could take a picture of the man who can outrun a missile with a crappy iPhone camera. I refuse to believe that. (But that doesn’t really hold any weight at all against Felicity, and she truly needs a friend right now, so we’re just going to stick with coming back from the dead as the Deus Ex Machina here).

Deus Ex Machina

_an unexpected power or event saving a seemingly hopeless situation, especially as a contrived plot device in a play or novel._

_ {Alludes to the practice in Greek and Roman theater of lowering an actor by stage machinery to resolve the plot or extract a character from an impossible situation} {Translates to “God From the Machine” _

 

_(I love you)_

Those words had echoed in her mind for weeks now.

_(I love you)_

In every conversation and sound and song that she heard, they were always in the background, hovering, echoing, like a quiet ghost of the man who said them to her.

_(I love you)_

They had meant everything to her since he said them. They meant that he was still Oliver Queen somewhere in there. They meant that he died knowing his priorities. They meant that _he loved her_. And that meant something.

_(I love you)_

Except now it doesn’t.

_I love you_ means nothing more to her than that he loves her. And that, apparently doesn’t mean anything. He loves Thea too. He loved Sara too. Yet, he is going back on all of that, doing things she never could have imagined in any possible universe, as she had just said earlier that day, and for what?

(Vengeance). (Putting the safety of Thea above everything else). (A long forgotten vendetta). (Putting safety and vengeance and vendettas above love every time). (What else did she expect?)

(Maybe she expected him to come back different).

(Maybe she expected him to come back as a man who the words _I love you_ meant something to).

(Maybe she expected that _I love you_ meant that he could finally be with someone that he could really care about).

She needs some air.

And, for once, he actually comes after her. And the words _I love you_ can be heard in his footsteps and she can feel her breath catching in her chest and _please no not this time not now any time other than this_ and she _cannot_ talk to him right now.

_(I love you)._

_(I don’t want to be a woman that you love)._

She should’ve known it was too good to be true. People don’t just come back from the dead twice in their life and have everything be okay. People don’t just come back from the dead after telling someone that they love them for the first time and have everything be okay and have fate let them just be in love with each other. That would just be too easy.

And life can’t be a _deus ex machina_ just once, can it?

Life just can’t give her a _fucking break_ for once, can it?

(This is almost as bad as him dying).

_Don’t breathe too deep._

_Don’t think too hard._

_Don’t delve in your anger like you did in your sadness._

_Don’t focus on the lightning storm growing inside your chest and threatening to electrocute everyone and everything around you._

_Just get home._

She makes it to the door.

And she can’t lock herself in her room this time, because they need her, because her city needs her, because if there’s anything Oliver’s absence over the past few weeks has taught her is that this is her crusade her too.

And he can work with Malcolm Merlyn and be broody and angsty and climb that salmon ladder a billion times a day and have the nerve to tell her he loves her _again_ , and it will not stop her from coming into the Foundry every night.

She’s not going to let him keep her from doing what’s right.

(Even if he’s doing what’s wrong).

(What is so exceptionally totally absolutely completely unthinkably wrong).

But just because she can’t lock herself in her room doesn’t mean she can’t repeat other things that she did the last time she got news that shocked her to the core and made her want to throw up and cry and scream and hurt somebody at the same time. It doesn’t mean she can’t pull out every tub of icecream she owns along with a few bottles of wine because God knows she deserves it and wrap herself in blankets that feel the exact opposite of how her insides are feeling right now and put on an episode of her favorite tv show.

But then she opens the DVD drive.

And a disk comes out despite none of her own disks being missing from their cases.

Its Psych.

Season 3.

Barry must’ve left it here the last time she did this.

She’s suddenly ice cold and she’s afraid the shards of ice inside her stomach have pierced through her.

Maybe she’s dreaming.

Maybe he’s still dead.

Maybe she passed out after he came back.

Maybe he doesn’t actually want to work with Merlyn.

She pinches herself.

She’s not dreaming.

She picks up the phone.

.

.

.

She lets him past the door when he knocks this time.

But she’s clutching this long pink jacket to her like a security blanket. (Truth be told he doesn’t remember her wearing jackets like this much before Oliver left). (Maybe they are a type of security blanket).

She looks more broken than she’d sounded on the phone. Her voice had sounded angry and tired and tense and cold, but her face just looks broken. Absolutely broken. He doesn’t need to ask what’s wrong. He can see it all over her face.

“Don’t ask me what’s wrong please.” She starts, her voice sounding shaky and hollow and completely different from how she had been on the phone. She wipes away a tear with the sleeve of her pink coat. “I can’t talk about it right now.”

This time they don’t pretend that they’re in love with each other. This time it wouldn’t help anyway. Barry has a kind-of-girlfriend now and the great love of Felicity’s life is back from the dead.

This time, he doesn’t tell her about Iris. (He doesn’t even tell her about Linda). (Or Caitlin).

This time, she can stomach watching Game of Thrones.

And she does.

And then she pulls up Hulu and they watch Agent Carter. (And Barry thinks maybe its because she needs some affirmation that a woman can kick ass and save people even without the hero) (okay, that’s not fair, Peggy Carter becomes a hero in her own right) (and Felicity is already a hero in her own right) (she just might not know it yet) (maybe she needs to know that a mask does not a hero make).

Its the second night in a row that Barry takes care of a girl who’s gotten insanely drunk. But Felicity is a different kind of drunk than Caitlin is.

First of all, she doesn’t sing.

Second of all, she gets overly emotional. And not the type of overly emotional that most guys think of when they hear that phrase. The highest emotion on her checklist is anger, and she is so so so angry.

_“Does_ I love you _even mean anything anymore?”_ she asks him, _“what even is love anymore, because I’m not sure I know.”_

He wishes he knew the answer.

He wishes he could run around and fix all her problems.

_(Guys like us don’t get the girl). (Fuck that Oliver) (Felicity deserves to be happy) (she deserves to believe you when you tell her you love her) (she at least deserves some sort of closure) (who gives a shit what guys like us get when girls like her are constantly getting the short end of the stick?)._

And he’s not under Bivilo’s influence or anything, but Felicity’s anger is contagious. And, as much as he hates to admit it, he’s taking her side.

Maybe its because he can’t understand duty and sacrifice and justice over love.

Maybe its because what’s the point of being a hero when you can’t love?

Maybe its because what’s the point of being a hero when love means nothing to you?

He loves Iris.  
He loves Joe.

He loves his dad.

He loves Caitlin.  
He loves Cisco.

He loves Wells.

He loves Felicity.

He wouldn’t be doing what he does in Central City if he didn’t love them.

He’s not like Oliver, where he’s just is looking to save everyone and everything before he can live his life. He doesn’t want to die in Star Labs after being hit by another metahuman or a bullet. He wants to die old and happy having done the best he can to save everyone, with Iris with whoever makes her happy, having met Caitlin’s children, and Cisco’s wife. (And, if he’s being honest, he wants to die having seen Oliver Queen marry Felicity Smoak).

He doesn’t tell her any of this though, and they just continue to watch Agent Carter.

“And the absolute _worst_ part about all of this is that he thinks he needs to protect me. _He wouldn’t need to fucking protect me if he’d just let me train with someone other than Dig, who goes easy on me anyways._ E _ven Laurel gets more fucking training than me. But what do you expect?_ _She’s_ gorgeous fucking Laurel.” And then her voice gets dangerously and rarely quiet for the level of alcohol she’s consumed, and frankly, Barry’s a little bit terrified. “At least he didn’t really mean it when he said he loved her either.”

And then the anger breaks into sadness, but this time she won’t let Barry hug her, she just throws a wine glass against the wall and it shatters into a million pieces, and he quickly gathers them up so she won’t step on them and hurt herself any more.

And while he’s cleaning them up, she falls over on the couch and cries into the dove pillows that sit there, and he’s so so so scared and confused and _he doesn’t know how to comfort her when she won’t let him touch her or talk about what’s upsetting her._

(He feels kind of like throwing a glass himself).

She gets one call from Oliver, and Felicity won’t even look at her phone, so Barry lets it go to voicemail.

She also gets calls from Diggle and Roy.

And Laurel.

Laurel calls more than once.

Felicity nods at Barry when he asks her if he can answer Laurel’s fifth call. He tells the attorney, who he’s never even met, but who Felicity has told him lots about during the times when they hang out when no one is crying or dying or coming back from the dead, how Felicity’s doing, and she asks if she should come over.

Felicity shakes her head.

Barry tells her no.

(He does tell her, however, that she should probably come over the next day with an expert hangover cure) (and maybe some boxing gloves).

(He hopes she does).

But when he turns away from the phone, he finds that Felicity has cried herself to sleep. She’s face down in one of her pillows and he’s afraid she might suffocate herself, so he carries her to her bed like he had done with Caitlin, but doesn’t change her into her pajamas, because drunk Felicity is a lot scarier than drunk Caitlin, and, although she still has her pink coat on like a security blanket, she’d changed into a pair of grey sweatpants before he came over, and he only knows this because a black and white dress is crumpled on her bedroom floor, and its also quite covered in black, teary, smudges of makeup.

He calls Star Labs.

They don’t need him at the moment.

Of course, Caitlin is the one to answer the phone, and she understands probably more than anyone else how Felicity feels. (Having the person you love come back from the dead only to realize that they’re not the person you thought they were seems to be too common of an affliction these days). She says if anything major happens, they’ll call him, but Felicity needs him right now more than they do.

And she’s right. Because Felicity wakes up an hour after she’s gone to sleep, when Barry is going around her house cleaning up after the mess they’ve made, because he refuses to let her sink into the state she was after she first heard Oliver was dead.

.

.

.

She has the same dream she’s had for weeks.

Except this time she kisses him even while the blood starts pouring out of his mouth, and she finds herself choking on it.

(Maybe she continued kissing him in her dream because she didn’t kiss him tonight).

She wakes up mid-motion, and then she’s in the bathroom, puking her guts out into the toilet, with Barry holding her hair out of her face, and hugging her close like she hasn’t let him do all night.

When she’s done puking her guts out, she hugs him back.

And she tries not to notice how the leather of his suit feels against her skin and how this hug compares to one she had earlier that night.

If she really focuses, its not hard.

Because Oliver smells like sweat and forest and blood and silver.

And Barry smells also like sweat, but also like pavement after it rains, and copper and her favorite type of ice cream (although that last one might be because she’s pretty sure she spilled a bit of mint chip on him earlier that night).

There’s not blood in the toilet.

She wishes there was.

Then she might still be dreaming.

Then she might not be infuriated at Oliver for agreeing to work with _Malcolm Merlyn_ of all people.

Because she’ll swallow his blood in a dream a million times over before she’ll swallow her pride and her beliefs and let him tell her he loves her when she knows it doesn’t mean anything.

(It means more than when he first said it in the mansion, but not by much).

But no, because life isn’t a novel and it isn’t full of shitty _deus ex machinas_ , as much as she wishes it was.

As much as she wishes she was still dreaming.

If she is dreaming, this is one of the worst kinds of nightmares.

(She’s not going back on what she said, though).

(If thats how he treats the woman he loves, than she doesn’t want to be a woman he loves).

(She does want to be loved by him unconditionally and fully, though).

(There’s a difference).

(And she doesn’t mean in the way that Barry loves her unconditionally and fully). (Because that is a purely platonic type of love) (and not in the type of platonic that she’d first envisioned him saying the words “hold onto me tight”).

She lurches forward again, her throat raw and the chunks of Indian takeout she’d had for dinner scraping against the sides of it.

She’s dehydrated and out of tears.

Also, despite Barry’s best efforts, she’s gotten a bit of puke in her hair.

“I’m going to take a shower.” She declares, despite her voice sounding like platform heels scraping on concrete.

“I’m going to make some coffee if you want some.” He replies.

She nods her head in response, and then he leaves her alone in the bathroom.

The water runs hot, but it does nothing to quell the chilling of her blood. Strands of blonde hair come away from her head, tangled in her fingers, and she remembers Barry convincing her to dye it again after the last time he visited, telling her that she can’t stop living her life just because Oliver had stopped living his.

(She supposes this is still true). (Just because Oliver has given up every shred of his humanity and morals to become nothing more than a symbol and figurehead it doesn’t mean she has to stop living her life). (And if she’s being honest, she kind of just wants to live it even more) (really rub it in his face that she is living her life) (without him) (as much as she wishes it wasn’t) (but they’ve both made their decisions) (and really they’re both too stubborn to go back on them). (She wishes he would go back on his). (If he did she would go back on hers).

Suddenly she realizes the water on her face may not be all from the showerhead.

When she gets out, she changes into a different pair of pajama pants. She doesn’t want to wear the ones filled with anger and puke and ice cream and wine. She chooses a soft white pair that she doesn’t really remember buying and a grey sweatshirt thats been too big for her for forever.

A red robe peeks out from the back of her closet.

She ignores it.

Red is a color of passion and love.

And right now she’s feeling none of that.

A blue pair of socks catches her eye in one of her dresser drawers.

She ignores them.

Blue is a color of calm and easiness.

And right now she’s feeling none of that.

Black and white and grey are easy. They are for opposite emotions, for having your dreams come true only to suffer immensely, for the highest of highs mixed with the lowest of lows. With the grey in between for confusion and hurt.

(She finds she always wears some shade of black or white or grey when she runs to Barry for comfort) (from the flowered dress she wore when they kissed on the train) (to the black one with all the cutouts that she’d planned to wear on a second date but ended up wearing for trivia night when the first date went to hell) (to the white jacket she’d worn when she first went to Central City) (to now, when she can’t find herself even looking at anything colorful because color means emotions and emotions means dealing with her feelings).

Barry has a cup of coffee for her when she comes out. And a hug. (He’s one of the best huggers she knows).

And now she’s ready to talk to him. Tak and not rant. Not rant like she was ranting drunk a few hours ago.

So they talk.

And he tells her she’s right and that Oliver’s head is up his ass.

That helps. (But only a bit).

And then he has to go.

And she goes to bed.

And then she gets up and her head hurts and she’s not sure if its because she dreamed he came back and didn’t team up with Malcolm Merlyn or because of how hungover she is.

Living in Vegas, however, she’s gotten pretty good at hiding a hangover. (Most of the experience was from helping her friends hide their hangovers) (since her mother would’ve loved for her to be hungover just once).

And so she chooses a black dress that doesn’t have a v-neck and isn’t too short, and pairs it with a metallic choker necklace, and she conceals her dark circles, and she finally looks slightly like she’s in mourning. (Funny because he’s alive now).

And Laurel stops by in the morning and they talk and Felicity decides she likes this girl more than she was willing to admit previously. (Also they seem to share the affinity for long coats). And they walk into the lair together, and her long coat feels like armor.

And she sits down in her chair in front of the computers, and clutches the arms of it tight when Oliver says a tired, faraway _good morning_ , and the chair feels kind of like a throne.

And she holds her head high, because his last name may be _queen_ , but if she tries hard enough, she can look like one. (If only thats how she felt).

And her and Laurel take on the day (and the boys) together. Like the pair of queens they are.

.

.

.

He leaves when he’s sure Felicity is sober enough to understand that she is asking him to leave.

And then he decides to check in on the people he loves, the people who he could not crusade without.

Barry wonders what he would do to save any of their lives, what he would give up.

He would give up his speed to protect any of them.

He would give up his house for any of them.

His job.

His fame.

His degree.

He would give up his life for any of them.

But his love? His humanity?

That’s practically unthinkable.

(Then again, Oliver Queen has always been an expert at the unthinkable).

(Then again, Oliver Queen has been doing this hero thing a lot longer than he has). (Felicity Smoak has been doing this hero thing a lot longer than he is). (And she hasn’t given up her humanity completely) (but its costing her).

(Hopefully that sort of thing only happens in Starling City).

(He can’t imagine that sort of thing happening in Central City).

Despite Wells warning them against going downstairs and chatting to the metahumans they have imprisoned there after what happened with Cisco, Barry goes down there anyway, because Felicity’s situation makes him think of Shawna Baez, who loves her boyfriend despite him using her power to get him out of a bad situation that she had nothing to do with in the first place.

She is sitting down opposite the sealed door, and she can’t see him coming, one-way-glass and all, but he decides to talk to her anyways, because he’s a hero, not a monster.

“Hey, um, I just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing?”

“Why do you care?” Shawna snips back, her night eyes darkening, reminding Barry of Felicity’s tone on the phone earlier that night.

“Because I know what its like to get hurt by somebody you care about. And besides, Caitlin said solitary confinement can drive people crazy. We’re not monsters.”

“Screw off, Flash. I’d rather go crazy than have you pretend you know what I’m going through at all. Your powers make you a celebrity, mine make me a menace.”

“You see, that’s where you’re wrong. Your powers don’t make you a menace, its what you choose to do with them.”

“I didn’t choose what I did. I did it for love. There’s not much choice in that.”

“I have a friend in Starling City who used to think that was true. She decided today love doesn’t excuse unthinkable choices.”

“Good for her. Bet you she’s not in turmoil because of her less-than-legal activities.”

“Actually she is.”

“Where’s her cell?”

“A club basement in Central City.”

It’s not quite the truth, but close enough, because, from what Felicity told him, the basement of Verdant is a prison of her own design: she’s too invested to leave, but in too much pain to stay.

“You know, you don’t have to be this way.” He starts again, and the return of his voice makes Shawna jump just a bit. “You and me, we could be a team. You could be a part of something.”

“Try your hero talk on someone you didn’t just lock in solitary confinement, Flash.”

“If you ever change your mind, let me know.”

“Can’t really do that from here, can I?”

“I’ll stop by again.”

And he leaves. But he means his offer. Another metahuman to help the city would be amazing, especially one with Shawna’s talents… (he worries he might be starting to sound like Dr. Wells).

In the morning, he calls Felicity to check in. (She says she’s fine) (but they both know she’s lying) (she’s far from fine).

Then he calls Laurel to check in on how Felicity’s really doing. (She says they went to breakfast together) (that she’s holding her head high like a queen) (that Felicity’s lucky to have a friend like him). (Barry tells her Felicity’s lucky to have a friend like her). (He decides he likes Laurel Lance).

Then he checks the morning paper. Iris somehow must’ve gotten a picture of him on her iPhone camera.

(He figures that must be close to impossible) (especially seeing as iPhone cameras suck) (and he can move faster than a speeding bullet) (and a missile) (and an explosion) (and a boomerang).

Perhaps the miracles in the world do not only consist of Oliver Queen coming back to life only to break everyone again.

Its the first day Barry doesn’t trip once while running.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, this chapter is a lot longer than previous ones, but I had a lot to say. I would appreciate you commenting and letting me know if you like the direction this story is going in. (Also I'm pretty proud of Felicity at the moment) (AND HOW EXCITING IS IT THAT THEA IS GOING TO LEARN THAT OLIVER IS THE ARROW NEXT WEEK? I'M SO PUMPED!)


	5. Sirens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _the song of the **sirens ******is a strong one. it sometimes is hard for them to resist. sometimes dangerous life-ruining things are desirable. ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Three things:  
> 1.) I was fine with no Olicity in Arrow this week because of three reasons: Thea, Felicity and Laurel. The ladies on this show are absolutely amazing.  
> 2.) I am now a guilty as charged Linda Park fan, but don’t worry, I’m still definitely shipping WestAllen. I just can’t write anything about this week’s Flash without using her.  
> 3.) I am absolutely blown away by the amount of traffic this story is getting. Over 2,000 people! That's amazing! Thank you all so much!

Sirens

_anything that tempts a person away from safety and towards a destructive path_

_{Alludes to the mythological creatures in the Odyssey} {If any one unwarily draws in too close and hears the singing of the **Sirens** , his wife and children will never welcome him home again, for they sit in a green field and warble him to death with the sweetness of their song.}_

 

Felicity does not want Oliver to leave again without him knowing that she loves him. For him to know, though, she would have to turn on the part of her brain that gets the messages from her heart saying that she loves him. If she turns that on, however, then all the hurt and anger she’s been holding in over the past week will come flooding back to her again, and she will be too upset to talk to him, much less to confess to him that she returns his feelings. So he would leave without knowing anyway.

She’s gotten herself into quite the _Catch-22_ here. (It can’t be good for her mental health) (and Team Arrow needs her in top mental health) (mostly because she is the only one not suffering emotionally right now) (because she’s shut off the part of her brain that loves Oliver).

Telling him entails her going back on what she told him in the alley. And she is _not_ willing to go back on that. Going back on that would mean she’s choosing love of her own morality. (She’s done that once before) (and she’s never going to do that again). Felicity is not going to do that. Still, the call of the sirens is a tempting one. (But not tempting enough).

He told Thea about his less-than-legal nightly activities, something Felicity has been wanting him to do for years. If the suggestion had come from anyone’s mind but Malcolm Merlyn’s, she would have been on board, but, as such, she’s not. (Who could’ve thought _Malcolm Merlyn_ of all people would be the one to come between them?)

Felicity has only bet the younger Queen a few times. At parties mostly, and the few times she stopped by Oliver’s office back when Felicity was still his EA. (Back when the biggest things between them were Barry and Sara) (what she wouldn’t give to go back there again).

When Thea came into the lair while Laurel was dosed with vertigo, however, Felicity saw a new side to her. She was also a woman Oliver loved. Also one who was getting choices made for her by him. Also one who could take care of herself and who was a constant victim of his minor savior complex.

But she didn’t say anything.

Because Oliver could handle his family himself.

Not her family.

Not her problem.

But then Roy gets involved.

And Oliver is mad because _how dare he stand up to him?_

And then Felicity gets mad.

Because Roy is like family now. And her family means her problem.

And then, then she gets angry. Then she lets the two wires connecting her brain and her heart to come together for a second, because love inspires all emotion, and she can’t very well defend her family while she’s feeling dead inside.

Big mistake.

(Allowing herself to stop feeling dead inside) (not yelling at Oliver for yelling at Roy for standing up to him) (that was a great choice).

Thea doesn’t leave until after Felicity is done. She’s not sure if she’s ever shown her this side before. Her loud voice isn’t used for sisters-of-bosses-and-kind-of-significant-others; its used for the team.

The team now includes Thea.

Whether Oliver likes it or not.

(And now he’s leaving) (great job Felicity) (he’s going back to that island where he almost died and where he might die again because for all she knows Merlyn is just sending there to kill them off conveniently) (and she can’t tell him anything).

“So you’re leaving again?”

(She really can’t tell him anything).

(And the call of the sirens echoes desperately in the background) (she disconnects the wires).

.

.

.

Barry does not want to lose Linda. If he’s being frank, she’s one of the best things to happen to him since he became the Flash. (Thats mostly because becoming a super-speed having meta-human kind of dulls out everything good for a while). (But then he almost lost Iris) (and Oliver) (now he’s just happy to take all the good things he can get). He doesn’t want to lose her, so he has to choose sometimes between being the Flash and being Barry Allen. This is not a problem he anticipated that much. It would be so much simpler if he could tell her.

(And this time he doesn’t have Joe’s threat of death if he tells the truth).

But if he tells her the truth he might lose her. If he does nothing he might lose her. (And he really does not want to lose Linda).

Loving Iris was safe, and easy. It was what he’d always known. Forever and ever. (Not as safe as loving Felicity) (but they all knew that wasn’t going to work out). Loving Linda is like loving a giant ball of spice and energy and kisses and humor. Where Felicity is fireworks, Linda’s energy is a focused laser pointer that can cut through any metal shell.

(Iris’ energy is a spring rainfall or flowers blooming) (not as obvious but earth-changing).

Linda is unpredictable and independent and Barry is never totally sure how she’s going to react or what she’s going to do next. She’s one of the best things that’s happened to him recently.

Which is mostly why he can’t believe what Iris did.

Sure, it’s not as bad as he was making it seem when he questioned her about it. And sure, he was probably overreacting. But for someone who has claimed for years that she just wants him to find a girl who makes him happy, she sure is acting strange.

(He’s not reading too much into it) (he’s done this before and it never ended well) (for now he just wants to keep the amazing thing he has) (and not think about the amazing thing he really wants deep down).

With any other girl, he would not be having this conversation, but after what Iris told Linda, he was expecting her to bring it up again, so here they are. Iris is staring at him expectantly over her pizza, with a look that he can’t quite decipher. (If he’s being honest, he can’t quite decipher a lot of her).

“So, besides Iris, who else have you dated?”

Barry nearly chokes on his soda.

“I didn’t date Iris.”

“Same difference. Now come on, is there anyone I should be worried about?”

He thinks long and hard about the girls he’s tried to have a relationship with over the years. There was Jenny in college. And Brooke back in 2012. And then, of course, there’s Felicity (although Linda really shouldn’t be worried about her).

“Well,” Barry starts, “last year there was this girl that I met in Starling City…”

“Ooh, tell me more.” Linda teases, more interested in this than Barry thought she would be.

“Her name’s Felicity. You already know I’m a giant nerd, and she was one to - is one too, she’s not dead or anything. We tried to make it work, she even visited a few times, but it didn’t work out.”

“Because you were in love with Iris.”

“And she was in love with someone else.” He stirs his soda with his straw. “But its all good, we’re friends now. She even visits from time to time. You’d like her a lot.”

“Barry Allen, do you want me to meet your ex-girlfriend?”

“Kind of?”

“I’m just joking, of course I’ll meet her. You can’t be _that_ bad of a judge of character.”

“Hey!” He protests.

(He tries not to think about where Felicity was last week). (He tries not to think about where Caitlin is this week). (He tries to relish in this moment with Linda where she’s being wonderful and amazing again). (He tries not to think about how weird Iris is being). (But the call of the sirens is a strong one).

.

.

.

Thea stops by the Arrow Cave before her and Oliver leave. Oliver does not join her, having already said his goodbyes. (Felicity is glad he didn’t come back) (she’d just be tempted to tell him again) (she wants him to _come back_ come back, though) (she definitely wants that). Felicity assumes its mostly to say goodbye to Roy, but she swivels around in her chair when the younger Queen comes in the doorway anyway, because she’s decided she likes her.

And Thea is there mostly to say goodbye to Roy, but she gives Laurel a hug too.

And then she turns towards Felicity.

Diggle isn’t there, he’s with Sara, and Felicity kind of wishes he was, because then Thea might not feel as obligated to say goodbye to Felicity too, despite them only having spoken a few times.

Thea walks over quietly, tentatively, her shoes clicking softly on the concrete floor. Felicity tenses up a bit. (Also the red pen she’s been playing with between her fingers suddenly stops cold) (and then of course she realizes its a red pen) (and immediately regrets ever picking it up). “Hey, Felicity, right?” She asks.

“Yep.” She swivels to face Thea. “What can I do for you?”

“I know Roy probably isn’t going to,” she starts, glancing over to where he’s playing with some of Oliver’s arrows and pretending he isn’t eyeing the two of them like they might turn on him at any moment and yell at him, “but I wanted to thank you for standing up to Oliver with him yesterday. I know he can sometimes have his head up his ass, so its good to know I’m not the only one who tells him off.”

“Tell me about it.” Felicity mumbles.

“Also. I wanted to apologize. I didn’t realize you were a part of this whole _thing_ ,” she waves around, motioning to the glass case where Oliver’s arrow suit is. “So I’m sorry for thinking you were screwing my brother.”

She kind of mumbles the last part, and Felicity would be offended, if she hasn’t heard it so many times already. She’d heard it from Roy when he joined the team. And Laurel. And Isabel who knows how many times.

Felicity just smiles tightly, more at the _Oliver_ part of the comment than the _sleeping with_ part of it. “Its okay.”

“Because you’re not screwing, right?”

(No, they’re not) (they might be by now) (if he hadn’t been such an ass at the hospital) (and after he came back) (its really his fault they’re not) (and her moral principles) (the ones that rule that she should be angry when someone does something insanely _stupid_ and _careless_ ) (the ones that she’s never going back on).

“Right.”

“Good. Because I love him and all, but you’re way too good for him.” She turns her head a bit to look back at the Black Canary. “You too Laurel.”

This time, Felicity’s smile is real. “I like to think so.”

“Take care of Roy for me?” Thea asks.

“Always.”

This time, Thea cocks her head to the side a bit at Felicity’s answer. “You’re not screwing _him_ are you?”

“God no; Roy’s like my brother.”

“Don’t tell him, but I’d be kind of jealous if you did.” She teases. “Only kind of though.”

“Your secret’s safe with me. If you haven’t noticed, I’m kind of great at keeping them.”

“Looks like you all are.” Thea seems slightly sad at that. Its probably because she wishes Oliver had told her sooner. (Felicity wishes Oliver had told her sooner).

“Despite what Oliver thinks, this place does not belong to him, Thea. You’re welcome down here anytime you want. Come hang out with me when they’re out on missions sometime. It gets lonely here.”

“I’d like that.”

Yeah, Felicity definitely likes Thea.

She surprises Felicity by giving her a hug and then walks up the stairs and out the door. Immediately, Felicity turns to Roy, who is nonchalantly playing with an arrow and pretending he didn’t just hear the entire conversation.

“You heard what she said, didn’t you?” Felicity asks.

A smile bursts out on his face larger than one she’s seen him have in a while. That’s all the answer she needs.

.

.

.

Iris is using the word ‘ _great_ ’ a lot lately.

Her job is _great._

Linda is _great._

Barry’s new relationship is _great._

He doesn’t feel like the ‘ _great_ ’ actually means ‘great.’

And it would give him hope.

(If she were using great to describe her and Eddie’s relationship instead of Barry and Linda’s) (if she were using it to describe something other than the thing that was making him happy).

“Why are you doing that?” He asks the next time she does it.

“Doing what?” Iris asks innocently, but he sees a flicker of panic, or maybe its confusion, in her eyes.

“Saying _great_ like you don’t actually mean _great_. You’ve been doing it about your job ever since you got it.”

He fails to bring up how she uses it whenever he brings up Linda. He doesn’t want to fracture their friendship any more than he did last time they talked about her not wanting Barry’s new relationship to work out.

(She says she wants it to) (she says she knows he’s moved on) (he knows at least that second one isn’t true) (because he hasn’t moved on) (not completely anyways).

“I didn’t realize… I guess I just thought things would be different. I thought when I finally got what I’d been wanting forever that it would feel different or better. I want to be a journalist, just not like this.”

“I thought the Flash gave you a pretty good scoop last week.”

“I want something that’s not given to me. I want to work for something if its going to mean anything. And a story that I didn’t dig up the facts myself for doesn’t really mean anything.”

“Maybe he was just trying to help.”

“I think he just wanted a story to be printed and I was the only reporter he knew.”

“Someday you’ll have to introduce me.” Barry teases. (He should not have said that). (Immediately he is filled with regret) (Iris introducing the Flash to Barry would be a _very very very_ bad idea).

“That would be _great._ ”

(Okay, that time she was doing it on purpose).

Barry shoves her a bit. Like he used to do when they were kids and she was teasing him about being a galactic nerd. (And that reminds him of his conversation with Linda about Felicity).

“Felicity says Palmer Technologies is planning a business trip here in about a month.”

“Ooh, is Oliver coming too?”

“Iris, judging by the fact that Ray Palmer changed the name from _Queen_ Consolidated to _Palmer_ Technologies, I’d think that he is _not_ coming on a business trip with the company.”

“Pity. I’d thought he and Felicity were attached at the hip.”

(They had seemed that way the last time they were in Central City hadn’t they?) (Well they’re not anymore) (from what he’s heard from both Felicity and Laurel, the distance has been great and cold and wide) (he’s decided he likes Laurel, now that they’re bonding over mutual concern for Felicity).

(And maybe its good that now she’s telling him about Ray Palmer). (Maybe its good to move on when the people who you thought were the great loves of your life don’t work out).

He’s looking for a suitable answer, but then his eyes catch what her hands are fiddling with. Its the wedding ring that he gave her for Christmas. He puts his eyes on slow motion, lounging in the wonderful sense of comfort it brings him to watch Iris twist the ring around on its golden chain.

(He can’t remember when she started wearing it again.)

(She’d stopped for a bit after Christmas) (after he’d told her he loved her) (but she’s wearing it again) (and he can’t remember when she started).

(If he’s being honest, he likes it).

(That’s probably really bad of him).

“It’ll be nice to see her again, anyways.” Iris states. “Wish I could just jump forward in time to then.”

(He can jump forward in time). (At least that’s what Cisco says). (And he might try. If he really wanted to). (But honestly he’s scared to see the future). (And he’s scared he’ll mess up the past more than he already has).

(But it’s _time travel_ ).

(The sirens are calling).

(They’re saying travel in time).

(They’re saying kiss Iris).

(They’re saying ‘tell Linda you’re the Flash.’)

(Barry just might listen).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me what you guys think. Also are you all looking forward to the upcoming crossover ep? Because I sure am


	6. All That Glitters Is Not Gold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felicity finally had a chance with the one celebrity she'd ever sort-of-thought was cute, but she gave it up because she respected her values and morals more.  
> Barry had a chance to save his mother, but he gave it up because it ruined the people who had become his family and the life that he was leading.  
> A prime example of the fact that _all that glitters is not gold. ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know what? i give up i give up i give up because the flash is now on hiatus for a month to catch up with arrow’s timeline a bit and i’ve already said screw the timeline so yeah, i’m just going to mess with it even more and say that Barry’s already gone and changed the past at this point because the writers of these two shows are jerking me back and forth so much that i think i’m getting whiplash.  
> also everything i know about Barry’s time travel consequences are from the comics, and since Felicity and Oliver are not in that specific comic, I am going to make up literally everything having to do with that okay?  
> (also i think this might be the most cliche of all the chapters so far but I couldn't just let that scene in 3x14 go unwritten about)

All That Glitters Is Not Gold

_not everything that is shiny and superficially attractive is valuable._

_{Alludes to Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice} {There is a written scroll! I'll read the writing. / **All that glitters is not gold** } _

 

Felicity Smoak first finds out who Oliver Queen is when she’s thirteen, and she’s sitting on her twin-bed, complaining loudly about the boys in her grade to her neighbor, Caity, who’s watching her for the night, and the older girl pulls a slightly crumpled teen-girl magazine out of her purse.

Felicity knows Caity probably didn’t actually buy it, and most likely stole it from the magazine rack at the front of the motel she works at, but she doesn’t actually care, because then Caity is flipping through the pages like she’s done it a billion times, and pointing out the picture of a young billionaire at his eighteenth birthday party, smiling for the cameras like he hasn’t got a care in the world, with a brunette on his arm.

“Now you _can’t_ tell me all boys are awful after seeing _that_ face.” Her neighbor persuades, flipping a strand of maroon hair out of her face. (Felicity wishes she could dye her hair. Any color but the one she has now would be amazing. She wishes she could look just like Caity when she’s her age) (then maybe the boys in her grade would actually look at her and she might not find them so awful).

And Felicity has to admit, she can kind of see it, she can see the way his blue eyes sparkle mischeviously, and the small smirk he’s giving to the camera as if he knows some secret about the photographer that they don’t.

When Caity rips out the picture and gives it to her, Felicity is beyond touched. “Here, just look at him whenever you’re complaining about the boys you know. His name is Oliver Queen.”

“Oliver Queen.” Felicity repeats, the name sounding foreign on her tongue. “Don’t you want to keep this picture?”

“Oh I’ve got hundreds of them.” Caity replies, holding up the second page of the article on Oliver Queen with a metallically-manicured hand. “See?”

Felicity wishes she hadn’t. Because what she sees is him looking at another girl, despite the lovely lady on his arm, with a look similar to the one she would see on her dad’s face whenever they would go out on the strip without her mother back when he was still around. She doesn’t want to see him like that. She wants an image that isn’t so tainted.

Caity tapes the picture on Felicity’s mirror, and she keeps it there for a few months, barely glancing at it, as kind of a joke, and as a way to remind herself that, despite not having any friends at school, she has Caity.

And then Caity gets hit by a drunk driver on the way home from one of her shifts at the motel and she’s drifting in and out of consciousness for days. The last time Felicity sees her friend is the one time she skips school to go visit the hospital. She watches Caity’s chest rise and fall like she’s sleeping, and is absolutely terrified because she can’t do anything about it. Her hair looks less red and more purple when she’s that pale. She dies the next week, and Felicity doesn’t even get to say goodbye, because her mother is working and can’t take her to the funeral.

She keeps the picture on her mirror after that in memory of Caity.

And if the blue eyes stick inside her head, then so be it.

(And if she complains to the picture about boys like she used to do with Caity then so be it).

She takes it down the three times she ever has a guy in her bedroom.

Jack Ramone.

The kid from her history class freshman year who wants to copy her notes, but, as it turns out, actually wants a lot more than that.

Meyers Dare.

The student council vice president her junior year who asks her to Junior Prom, and she says yes, because they both know if they don’t go with each other nobody will go with them, but who ditches her for the head of the debate team first chance he gets.

Travis Hartzel.

Her date to homecoming senior year who was in her Hebrew Class when she was younger, and who she’s never saw in any way other than friendship until he asks her out and then _wow maybe she does like him_. He’s the first boy she ever babbles in front of. He’s the first boy she ever breaks up with, because she graduates high school a semester early, and is offered a spot at MIT, and she knows that long distance relationships don’t work out. (Actually, at this point, all she knows is that no relationship lasts forever).

She brings the ripped magazine page to college with her, but forgets to unpack it, because there’s this guy in her dorm with dark eyes and almost as much knowledge about computers and coding as her, and he seems so interested in her, and she thinks she might actually stand a chance. Until he starts dating a girl down the hall with dark hair and black skinny jeans and leather jackets.

And she doesn’t need to tell the picture about him, because she actually has _friends_ here, despite them being a bit older than her.

The first color she dyes her hair is black.

And then she hacks into the school for him to change his grade in the one class he’s failing by 5%, which causes him to pass.

And then he kisses her, and she discovers she likes kissing a boy while wearing lipstick, because she can leave her mark all over him, so, even after he leaves her, some of his shirts will still be smeared with her mauve lipstick and he will never be able to forget about her like her dad forgot about them.

Except Cooper Sheldon doesn’t leave her. Not for almost two years. And when he does leave he does so kicking and screaming and its only because he was trying to something good and amazing.

But she can’t be Felicity Smoak, with the dark lipstick and the raven hair and the piercings and the leather anymore, because that’s _Cooper’s_ Felicity.

So she dyes about her hair.

She thinks about dying it maroon, just like Caity’s used to be, but that looks too much like old Felicity, and so she does the one thing she’s been wanting to do ever since Noel Harper was the first girl in her grade to ever be asked out.

She dyes her hair blonde.

And she buys a crazy amount of pencil skirts and Mary Jane heels, and ties her hair back because really, if she’s going to be working with computers, there’s no reason for it to be getting in her eyes. And, as she’s going through her old boxes, trying to find something, anything that doesn’t look like old Felicity, she comes across the old picture of Oliver Queen.

He died a while back, along with her faith in that picture, but it reminds her of why she came to MIT in the first place.

So she submits a resume to the Queen Consolidated branch near MIT when she finds out they’re hiring in their IT Department, and starts working there while she finishes college.

She graduates two years earlier than predicted. Only half a year after Cooper leaves. And she’s offered a job in Starling City working in the main offices, with the Queen family in the same building.

(She thinks it may be irony that the family of the guy she had a giant crush on for years want to hire her) (well, its not them hiring her exactly) (its the people who work for them) (and they can’t possibly know about her old crush on him) (because that would be impossible).

Its a year after she moves to Starling City, and she’s monitoring QC’s networks, despite no one having asked her to, just because she can and she cares about this company (no matter how much she hates her supervisor), when she sees something interesting.

Oliver Queen’s name appears on the logs as having just logged in by fingerprint no less to Moira Queen’s computer.

And that _can’t be right._

(Its possible for sure) (but only by someone with a hacking knowledge at least as good as her own) (and she knows for a fact she’s the best one in Starling at the moment).

So she goes to check, black Mary Jane heels clicking down the hallway.

No one is in the office, but she checks near the computer anyway for a flash drive or a bug or even someone hiding under the desk, but no one’s there. And she thinks she may have imagined it, and frankly she’s not concerned enough to hack into Moira Queen’s computer and risk being fired.

And she sees a picture of Oliver Queen, taken just before he went on the Queen’s Gambit, and lets her inner monologue run freely.

She doesn’t see another picture of Oliver Queen until three years later, when it turns out he actually is alive, despite all the odds. She wishes she would’ve known that in college. Things might’ve gone a bit smoother.

The first time she _really really_ sees Oliver Queen is when he walks into her office with a laptop full of bullet holes and insists that he spilled a latte on it.

She’s chewing on a pen.

(It was red).

And then this whole mess got started.

But that’s not what Felicity is thinking about at the moment, because Oliver is gone and on Lian Yu again and she didn’t tell him anything, (she barely said goodbye) and she’s worried as hell and just wants to go back to the days when he was a figure and not a person.

(Not a real actual person who could die at any moment and who is the cause of all her recent suffering).

Sadly, all that glitters is not gold.

And she wishes she could go back to that moment and just revel in how young and innocent and naive she was, because never in a million years would twenty year old Felicity Smoak have thought she would walk away from Oliver Queen telling him she did not want to be a woman he loved. (And really she would’ve thought about it as dishonoring Caitlin’s memory).

But she can’t travel in time.

.

.

.

Barry can travel in time.

But what use is it when he can’t save his mother because it results in everyone he loves becoming people he can’t even recognize. And he may not have told the others, but he checked in on his friends in Starling City when the timeline changed, and what he found was not what he’d ever wish upon them.

Because Oliver Queen died because Barry Allen was not in Central City to be knocked out and to save him.

Because Felicity Smoak may still have her fancy new job at Palmer Technologies, but she looks like she’s been broken for years, and she’s dyed her hair a dark auburn, and he thinks its a pity because he knows he wasn’t the only one particularly fond of that color.

Because Roy Harper got killed trying to save the Glades by himself.

Because John Diggle is back doing security guard duty.

Because Verdant has been left empty for years and years.

Because he never would’ve had it in him to save the people of Central City if he hadn’t taken that trip to Starling, and the Flash would’ve never existed.

And Because Central City was a thousand times harder to watch than Starling, but he can’t think about that, not now, because it hurts far too much.

But what’s the point of being able to time travel when all you do is mess things up.

(It really should’ve been enough to deter him from ever wanting to try again). (But then he figures he shouldn’t change the past too much if he goes back just to watch).

The first time he goes back in time after the incident with his mother, he goes to see what happened while he was in a coma.

He doesn’t change anything, doesn’t even step on a butterfly because his feet are moving too fast to touch anything really, just sits back and watches, and he’s incredibly touched.

Because he hadn’t realized just how much everybody cared about him.

(Especially Iris). (He hadn’t realized just how much she’d screamed and cried every time she thought he’d died). (He hadn’t realized how much the entire department missed him). (He hadn’t realized how Caitlin and Cisco became fond of him without even meeting him).

And he goes forward a bit and watches Iris get together with Eddie, despite how much he knows its going to hurt, because he needs this so he can be really sure he’s over her. (But he’s not over her). (Good thing lying to yourself isn’t a crime).

And then he goes a little farther back, remembering the words he’d told Iris when he’d finally confessed to her he loved her.

_Junior Prom_

_When he left for college._

_When he came back from college._

And he becomes incredibly shocked (and a little sad) that Iris never noticed his feelings, because, from an outsider’s point of view, they are so incredibly obvious that its actually pretty embarrassing.

Barry decides he likes watching his past. He hadn’t realized just how much of it he’d forgotten. Little details that he’d changed or altered just to make memories seem in a different light.

And then he remembers Iris and her _great_ ’s, and he decides to go back and see if she’d been doing the same thing when Felicity came to town, because he just needs to know if Iris is really jealous, or if she just has a vendetta against Linda. (Why anyone would have a vendetta against Linda, Barry has no idea). (Then again, a vendetta against Felicity is even more unthinkable).

There’s only one instance. He’s walking into Jitters with Felicity, and Iris asks them about their day and Felicity answers with “I’ve seen some pretty amazing things.” At the time, he knew she was talking about his super-speed and meeting Dr. Wells, and didn’t think it could be taken any other way, but he always seems to forget that Iris doesn’t know about his second life.

“ _Really_?” Iris asks, her voice getting a bit high in the middle, and it sounds almost exactly like her _great_ ’s nowadays.

He wants to revel in that fact. Wants to soak in that she might love him even a little bit in a way that is not platonic, but that is almost just as painful as thinking about his alternate-timeline Central City friends.

Between each of these timeline jumps, he has to take a few days off, because running that fast and hard and seeing stuff like that can’t be affecting his health in a very positive manner, and it is on one of these days, a Thursday night to be exact, when he’s on the phone with Felicity, that he realizes, despite having seen her many times back-in-time, she still doesn’t actually know about his newfound abilities.

“We found out something pretty cool recently.”

“Ooh. What is it?”

“I can travel in time now.”

He can practically see her choke on her coffee. And then she starts to ramble and babble on in the beautiful way that she does, and it almost reminds him of Martin Stein’s ramble on the same exact subject, except the way Felicity says it is so different.

Sure, at first she talks about theories and speed and alternate timelines and paradoxes and the like, but then her thoughts go to a different place altogether. She asks him what he’s seen, and he tells her how he’s just been going back and re-watching parts of his past with a new set of eyes.

“I wish I could do that. It’d be nice to go check in on lonely high school Felicity.”

“You can’t have been that lonely in high school. I guarantee you I was more.”

“That’s not fair, you had Iris.”

They get a little silent after that, because he doesn’t want to talk about Iris, and talking about Iris inevitably leads to talking about Oliver, and he has a very strong feeling that she doesn’t want to talk about Oliver. She doesn’t ask about Linda either though, because that leads to the Iris road.

He thinks about her first statement for a bit, though. He wonders if there’s a fiction-proof suit small enough to fit Felicity. He asks Cisco kind of on the down low.

Turns out Cisco also designed one for the women firefighters, but he’s never brought it out before, because Barry obviously wouldn’t fit in one. And he’s right, of course, there’s no way Barry would fit in this suit. Felicity just might, though.

“I just need to warn you though,” Cisco starts, “if you’re planning on using one of these to tell Linda or Iris that you’re the flash, you might want to lead with something other than time travel.”

“Don’t worry, it’s not for them.” He assures him.

“I don’t think Caitlin would want to…”

“Its not for Caitlin either.”

Then he sees who he’s asking for pop into Cisco’s head, and his friend’s eyes widen a bit. “If anything happens to her, you might get an arrow in you.”

Barry knows its true, but he counters anyway. “Nothing’s going to happen, Cisco, I just want to show her something.”

“How come you never do that for us?”

“Are there any friction-proof suits your size?”

And then Cisco’s eyes light up. “I’ll get right on that.”

He shows up at Felicity’s apartment that Saturday, and realizes its the first time he’s come over in a while where she hasn’t been totally and absolutely broken. He takes the train this time, knowing he’s going to have to save his energy for the actual time-travel part.

When Felicity opens the door, Barry holds up a wrapped box and a bag of Chinese takeout. “Happy Chinese New Year!” He greets.

She pulls him into a hug, despite being mostly in her pajamas. “Why is it whenever you come over you bring me food? You know I don’t need as many calories as you.”

“Trust me,” he answers, “you’re going to need energy for what we’re doing today.”

“Just exactly how _physical_ are we talking here?” She asks, and then immediately blushes realizing the other implications of what she’s just said. “And by physical I mean totally platonically physical. And not like a friends-with-benefits type of physical either. Just good, old-fashioned, working-out, trying to keep up with your lightning speed, type physical.”

Most people would find Felicity’s Freudian slips off-putting, but Barry really finds them endearing. “Just open the box, Felicity. I think you might understand a little then.”

She rips off the wrapping paper to reveal her very own Flash suit. “Is this your not-so-subtle way of telling me you want me to get struck by particle-accelerator-induced lightning?”

Barry laughs at that, but doesn’t answer her question, instead, he plows ahead to why he’s actually given her the gift. “Do you remember how, a few days ago, you told me you wished you could go back in time?”

And then her eyes get big and bright and happy in a way he hasn’t seen them get in quite a long time. She doesn’t say anything, and Barry wonders if he might get put in a book of World Records for rendering Felicity Smoak speechless.

“ _That_ is so all of your skin and clothes don’t burn off when we’re running fast enough to burn a hole in the space-time continuum.”

And then she hugs him again, but this time its not a friendly _hey-what-are-you-doing-here_ hug, but more of a _thank-you-thank-you-thank-you_ hug, which is also probably what she’d be saying if she still had control over her speech.

And then she does. “I’m going to go try this on.” She announces, finally, making her way over to her bedroom. You can get started on the Chinese.”

He does just that, but when she comes out of her room, in a red bodysuit identical to his in all ways except for the lightning bolts, a noodle falls out of his mouth. Then they have to take a picture, of course, because its not every day that they’re matching.

(Well there was that one time). (But with a pair so perfectly perfect as them, its to be expected that they’re going to match at _least_ once).

They do. Barry considers sending it to someone, but those in Central City are probably not on board with this idea (and he does _not_ want to be reprimanded by Caitlin for doing another thing that he knows is stupid for a girl), and those in Starling City will put an arrow in him for this, because there is a small chance (very very small) that this will not work, and Felicity does not have his super healing).

He decides to tell her this just before speeding out into the past.

“Just so you know, I’ve never done this before.” Barry announces right after she pulls the red face-mask over her blonde ponytail.

“What?” She screams, but her cries are lost in the present day as he shatters time and space.

He whispers in her ear to think of a very specific place to run to, and he clears his mind, because this sort of thing requires a fair amount of focus. Time flashes by them at impossible speeds, but then suddenly she cries out “Stop!” and they do.

 

They’re in an office in Queen Consolidated, and the clock on the computer in front of them says its 2010. The office definitely is definitely _not_ Felicity’s, because its covered in pictures of Oliver, Robert, and Thea Queen. Quickly, he moves them so they’re wedged in the dark, empty space between two ceiling-high bookshelves.

“This is kind of exciting,” she whispers into his chest.

He moves his finger to his lips, warning her to be quiet, because if they mess _anything_ up, there will be a giant mess on their hands.

And then something unexpected happens.

Barry assumes they’re waiting for fresh-out-of-college Felicity to walk through the doors, but she doesn’t. Instead, one supposed-to-be-stranded-on-an-island Oliver Queen jumps down from the ceiling, dressed all in black, and with hair so bad Barry almost laughs.

He feels Felicity tense up, obviously not understanding what’s going on, but they both stay quiet, trying as hard as possible not to mess up the timeline.

Oliver looks around for a second, before moving towards the computer sitting at the big desk in the center of the room. And then his large hand goes up to his ear, and Barry realizes he must have a comm.

“Yeah.” Is all Oliver says, in that short, clipped tone that Barry remembers him using back on his first visit to Starling City. “Okay. Why wouldn’t they take me out of the directory?”

This conversation is difficult to understand from only Oliver’s side, especially since he is doing that thing he does where he gives one word answers to questions that are probably a lot more than that. Oliver presses his finger to the computers’ fingerprint-reader, and the blue lights almost reveal their position, luckily he’s turned away. “Yeah. I’m in.”

Barry looks into Felicity’s eyes, trying to get her read on the situation, but all he sees reflecting back is pure and utter shock. She’s barely moving, but he can feel her heartbeat, since their chests are pressed together, and it's going almost as fast as his.

Oliver messes around the computer for a bit, continuing to give whoever is on the other side of the comm clipped answers, and then he plugs a thumb drive in.

“I’m not done.” He argues with the person on the other end of the comm.

And then the elevator doors _ding_ and he can feel Felicity hold her breath, because the sound of heels on tile are coming down the hallway. Barry would know that sound anywhere, because its _Felicity_ ’s heels, and he’s not sure which pair it is (he’s not that good) but he knows its hers.

Oliver panics, full out panics, and Barry’s not sure he’s ever seen him do that before, but continues to watch anyway as he pulls the flash drive out of the computer, and hides around the corner, just in time for a younger Felicity Smoak to walk into the door of the office.

They watch Oliver watch Felicity look at a photo on the desk. Barry remembers it as the one of Oliver and Mr. Queen.

“You’re cute.”

And now they’re both holding their breaths.

“It’s too bad you’re, you know, dead. Which is obviously a lot worse for you than it is for me.” Younger Felicity lets out a deep breath. “I really need to _learn_ , to stop _talking_ to myself.” She reprimands herself, and then walks out.

And then Oliver smiles.

And then Oliver leaves.

And then they both race off into the present before they can even talk about it.

 

They don’t talk about it until they’ve both changed out of their respective friction-proof suits and into normal clothes. They don’t talk about it until Felicity stops staring off into space and Barry thinks he may have broken her, because it’s not a very serious thing to break Felicity’s voice once in one day, but _twice_? That’s practically unheard of.

“Oh. My. God.” Felicity finally whispers, head buried in her hands. “Please tell me that was some insanely weird dream.”

“No, but are you feeling like it was? Because that might be a side effect of-”

“Not the time travel part. The part where I babbled to myself in front of a very not-dead, not stranded-on-an-island Oliver Queen with an awful haircut.”

“Yeah… sorry… can’t tell you that. Did you see that smile though? I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile when it wasn’t for the cameras.”

“Thats the smile he reserves for me.” She tells him, voice low and soft, and Barry’s afraid he may have broken more than just her voice, but then she smiles. “Thanks anyway, though. I needed that, needed to remember I used to be nothing more than an IT girl who graduated MIT a bit early.”

“You’re welcome.” He answers. “You think you’re going to tell him about what we saw?”

“I can’t think of any possible conversation where that could happen. _Here’s the address of that serial killer, oh and by the way we almost met two years ahead of schedule when you were in Starling but I only know this because Barry let me travel in time with him in a friction-proof-suit._ Yeah, that’ll go over well.”

He laughs. “Well I hope you had fun anyway.”

“I did, although I don’t think I’ll be doing that again soon, so you can give this back to Cisco.” She hands him the suit.

“Nah, keep it, he’s got like five more.”

“Bye Barry.”

“Bye Felicity.”

And then he leaves her apartment, a smile on his face, to go to the train station, because he’s too tired from all the time travel to run all the way back to Central City.

Time travel may be a prime example of _all that glitters is not gold_ because he couldn’t save his mom, but if he can get Felicity to smile again, it might just be copper.


	7. Bread and Circuses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Barry wakes up and Linda's hair is tickling his nose.
> 
> Felicity wakes up to the sound of rocket engines outside the window.
> 
> They should be happy, but they're not. And they can't help but wonder if their attempts at happiness are nothing but _bread and circuses. ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> things you need to know about me:  
> 1.) no matter how much i ship olicity, i am a felicity smoak stan first and foremost, so, judging by that, i will not, in any way imply that she regrets sleeping with ray. does she wish it was oliver instead? yes. but she made the move on him not the other way around and i intend to stick to that canon  
> 2.) do i ship raylicity? no. is there going to be a bit in here? yes. just like there is going to be a bit in the show, because i understand as a writer myself the benefits of having a foil to showcase something, and that’s just what raylicity is at this point.  
> 3.) any hatred towards felicity smoak of any kind will absolutely not be tolerated in the comments, i’m fine if you hate on raylicity or ray, but if you tell me she was out of character, behaving like a slut, or her actions somehow made her love for oliver “less pure” i will fight you  
> got that?
> 
> okay, sorry about that, i promise your weekly angst will resume now  
> this week’s chapter was inspired by the song _never be what you want ___by we are the in crowd:
> 
>  
> 
> _  
> _I can't figure you out, you've got more fight in you / than anybody else / And here's the part where I start to make my own damn decisions / and make a name for myself / I'll never be what you want / I wouldn't change any part of me / Just to make you stay / You had a piece of my heart / But not enough to just run away / 'Cause I know what's best for me ____  
> 

Bread and Circuses

_{offerings, such as benefits or entertainments, intended to placate discontent or distract attention from a policy or situation}  {Translation of Latin pānem et circēnsēs, a phrase coined by the Roman poet Juvenal : pānem, accusative singular of pānis, bread + et, and + circēnsēs, circus games}_

Barry wakes up because Linda’s hair is tickling his nose.

Her dark hair, which had been curly the night before, but which now is kind of messed up.

He thinks this should be happiness.

This should be complete and utter happiness.

So why is it not?

And it’s not that he’s not happy, because he definitely is, but its not total and utter, and there must be something wrong with that, because what guy his age wakes up next to his beautiful girlfriend, with the morning light hitting her cheekbones just right, and isn’t totally utterly happy?

He must be the exception.

The only exception, because he’s pretty sure that Eddie doesn’t wake up with Iris next to him and not feel totally, utterly happy.

That was a bad road to go down.

(He really shouldn’t be thinking about Iris when he’s with Linda) (he knows that much at least). (So why do his thoughts keep drifting there?).

He doesn’t have time to question his thoughts, however, because then Linda is waking up, her dark eyes heavy with sleep.

“Come back to bed.” She whispers, and Barry thinks about it, he really really thinks about it.

But then he realizes how hungry he is (his fast metabolism can’t go too long without eating like there’s no tomorrow) and so, he just kisses her forehead, and leaves her in bed.

She seems too tired to put up much of a fight after that.

He makes his way to the kitchen after putting on some clothes, because, despite Joe being gone for the night, he still shares this house, and there are respectful ways to do things. (Also he can’t even think about what would happen if Iris just barged in here unexpectedly) (she’s been doing that a lot lately, ever since Ronnie left) (and one experience of her walking in on him and Linda is two too many).

Linda comes in fifteen minutes later, wearing the blue and brown flannel shirt he’d been wearing last night, and it makes him happy. Really happy. (Not utterly totally happy though) (should that bother him as much as it does?).

She sneaks up on him as he’s pulling some orange juice out of the fridge, and the hairs on the back of his neck stand up a little as she presses a kiss to his shoulder blade, and then stands on tip-toes to whisper in his ear.

“What do you think about going salsa dancing tonight?”

How is he supposed to say no to that?

So, despite the fact that he totally, absolutely _cannot_ dance, (and he tells her that) he says yes anyway, because she makes him happy, and Linda doesn’t care if he looks awkward and goofy, because she’ll look awkward and goofy right along with him.

Also, the place she’s thinking of going has a salsa bar, and there’s no way they’re passing up another opportunity to try and beat each other in a spice-off for the title of Spice Champion of Central City.

It’s been passed between the two of them quite a lot since he ate that ghost pepper for her.

And he is happy.

So, so happy.

(But not perfectly and utterly).

.

.

.

Normally, waking up to find the other person gone is a bad sign. Normally, however, it is not four in the morning, and Felicity is not being woken up by something that sounds like a jet engine outside the window of Ray’s apartment.

She figures he’s probably gone out on his balcony to check out what’s making that horrible noise. And then she thinks maybe she should check in on her team, and see if they need help handling whatever’s going on. And then she remembers that she left her phone near the workbench where he’s been developing his super suit.

The rumbling that woke her up grows closer to the window again, and Felicity pulls on of the sheets around her and pads her way over to the large glass window that overlooks the skyline of Starling City. ( _God its so beautiful_ ).

Iron Man blasts past the window propelled by rockets about the size of her head.

Except its not him, because she _knows_ that suit; after all, she was part of its creation, and then she just gets ridiculously happy, because _finally_ someone has taken her opinion into consideration (more than that, really) and its done something wonderful. She’s helped to create something wonderful and exciting and she’s a part of something amazing again.

(Not that team arrow isn’t something amazing) (it just hasn’t felt that amazing lately) (and, if she’s really being honest, she hasn’t felt that needed there lately). (They definitely need her, that was proven after she walked out on them last month) (but they take her for granted) (Ray seems constantly amazed by her abilities) (and maybe she likes being appreciated). (maybe that’s why she kissed him last night when he listened to every word she said and Oliver didn’t seem to). (Who’s she trying to kid, that’s why she even came here) (that’s why this is where it is).

It feels the opposite of bad.

And sue her for going for something that makes her happy (even if its not as happy as she could be). Sue her for kissing someone who is everything she knows she wants (even if she wants it from Oliver). Sue her for getting into bed with a billionaire who treats her with reverence and respect and who is trying to save the city without even thinking about dropping a body.

She doesn’t regret this decision, not one bit. (Does she wish the night had gone differently before she showed up here?) (yes) (Does she wish Oliver had gotten his head out of his ass and not gone to Nanda Parbat, where he may very well die, to rescue Malcolm Merlyn?) ( _yes_ ) (Does she wish for once he had chosen her over his persona as the Arrow?) ( _a thousand times yes_ ). (It doesn’t matter though, because she can’t go back, can’t change the past) (if he has died this time, however, it _will_ break her).

Ray stops by the window, and uses his super suit to wave at her. _Waves_. It’s pretty adorable, and Felicity smiles. She might just be happy if she could sit in this moment and not pay any attention whatsoever to the voices and feelings and fears and history crowding in the back of her head.

She waves back, a smile threatening to take over her face.

Her eyes are visible in the reflection, though, and they tell a different story, because she is worried, so very very worried about Oliver. She’s worried about Thea. She’s worried about what letting Malcolm Merlyn into their lives is going to do. Hell, she’s even worried about Nyssa, because _why would they ever put the Heir to the Demon in a cage_?

She can't deal with thoughts like this right now.

So, she does what Thea’s been doing since she found out she killed Sara; Felicity takes a shower.

She puts her dress on from the other day, not really feeling up to wearing any of Ray’s clothes, because she’s still not totally sure what _this_ is. (She doesn’t even know if she wants to know what _this_ is, because defining it means its real and that means telling people and that means Oliver finding out and she’s not sure how she feels about that). No one is going to question it if she goes back to the Arrow cave like this; they’ve all had their fair share of nights without sleep, and she’ll just say she couldn’t even think about sleep or something along those lines, because she’s not sure she wants to tell anyone yet.

Ray comes in, in his full suit of metal, around the time that she enters the kitchen.

“Looks like you got it working,” she starts, wanting to talk about anything but their status.

“I had help.” He says, smiling, as he lifts up the face shield. (She can’t help but think that it doesn’t even compare to the way Oliver looks when he pulls back his hood). “I am going to get changed out of this now; can’t really hold a cup of coffee in this thing.” And he must notice the way her eyes light up at the word _coffee_ , because, as he’s walking back to his room, he calls back, “Coffee-maker’s to the left of the fridge, and the beans are in the cupboard above the oven.”

She doesn’t know why it makes her so happy. It’s been so long since she’s been in anything even remotely like _this_ (and she kind of doesn’t want to know what _this_ is), and she must’ve forgotten what it feels like for someone to look out for you in a way that _doesn’t_ involve your and/or their possible death or maiming.

She makes her cup of coffee, and then another, and Ray still isn’t out in the kitchen yet, so she goes back, and finds him at his workbench, working on the suit again. He smiles when she comes in, and she isn’t sure whether she’s worried or glad that there are no butterflies in her stomach.

“The rockets are malfunctioning a bit,” he gives, in explanation, “but that’s what test drives are for, right?”

Felicity isn’t quite sure what she wants to say, so she just nods.

And then her phone rings. It’s Laurel. Ray seems pretty occupied with the suit, so she picks up.

Laurel tells her Thea has freed Nyssa al Ghul in some crazy attempt at giving her vengeance, and that Dig and Oliver still aren’t back yet, and her and Roy are handling it, but they’d really like her here anyway.

Felicity says she’ll be right over.

“Going so soon?” Ray asks, although he doesn’t seem that disappointed about it.

“My friends are having a bit of trouble with an… enemy and... “

“Let me guess? It’s a long story.”

He makes her smile again.

(Her eyes don’t light up the way she knows they can, though).

She thinks about kissing him as a goodbye, but then thinks that might define their relationship too much, so she settles for a kiss on the cheek, and then leaves.

.

.

.

Felicity calls around noon. He’s sitting in Star Labs, chowing down on some Thai food in between missions, joking and laughing with Cisco and Caitlin.

He’s relieved.

She hasn’t called much since the whole fiasco with Oliver went down and they watched Agent Carter, so he’s glad to hear from her.

“Felicity.” He mouths to Caitlin and Cisco, before walking into the room with the treadmill so they don’t hear his conversation. Normally, he wouldn’t mind, but they still don’t know about Oliver almost-dying and all the stuff that’s been going on in Starling, and he doesn’t want to tell them anything without permission.

“I slept with Ray.” She blurts out when he picks up, and, for a moment, he’s confused, before he remembers who Ray Palmer is. “Isn’t he your boss? Isn’t that against, like, company rules or something?”

Felicity laughs. And this time it’s not a bitter laugh, like most of hers have been nowadays. “No, its not. Not when he’s the CEO and I’m the Vice President. Rules like that only apply to poor plebeians like yourself.”

And she’s teasing again too. She must really be in a good mood.

“You sound pretty happy about it.” He comments, his smile growing, because hers is infectious, even over the phone.

“I am… at least I think so. I mean, it was good. I mean he was good. I mean he’s such a good guy but…”

“No, I get it.”

“You can’t possibly tell me you feel this way with Linda.”

“Would you hate me if I did?”

“But she’s your _girlfriend_ , I don’t even know what we _are_ , I don’t even know if I want us to _be_ anything.”

“Have you, I don’t know, talked about it?”

“No….?”

“How did you not talk about it? Did you leave before he woke up?”

“No.”

“Did _he_ leave before _you_ woke up?”

“Well, kind of…?”

“ _Felicity?_ ”

“But it’s only because he was flying around in his super suit, which, by the way, I helped him design, and I was totally okay with that, because he only could finish the suit because he listened to everything I said and took it into consideration.”

She sounds bitter when she says that last part, and Barry wonders how bad things have been over at Team Arrow’s end of things. He can’t imagine what life would be like if Cisco and Caitlin dated and then broke up only for him to tell her he loved her to go die but then he came back but she didn’t want to be with him because he had his head up his ass. How awkward would that be? How awkward must things be?

He can’t even imagine it.

(Mostly because he’s pretty sure Cisco’s head would never get as far up his ass as he’s heard Oliver’s has been recently) (and partially because he knows Caitlin’s really the one in charge of the whole team, if not Dr. Wells so the parallel doesn’t really work out). (Funny how he sees himself in more of a Diggle or Roy position on the team despite being the face of the operation).

“ _Super suit_?”

“Yeah…”

“Like _Iron Man?_ ”

“Kind of?”

“Does Oliver know?”

“Goodness no. How well do you think _that_ conversation would go over? He doesn’t even know Ray and I are… whatever we are.”

“Felicity, he’s going to have to find out eventually.”

“I know.” She pauses for a second, and he can hear her start to breathe a little deeper, like she’s trying not to freak out. “He’s still not back from Nanda Parbat.”

“Panda _what?_ ”

“ _Nanda Parbat_ ,” she corrects him, “its the headquarters for the League of Assassins.”

“ _League of Assassins?_ ” Barry can hear his voice get a little higher at the name, but come on, a league comprised entirely of assassins? Who wouldn’t that scare?

“I shouldn’t even be telling you this.”

“You probably shouldn’t.”

“Is it wrong that I don’t think I _love_ love him?”

He racks his brain for an answer, but can’t seem to find one. A year ago, he would’ve said yes, but that was before everything happened with Iris and Felicity and Linda and his powers. He knows now that the world is twenty seven times more complicated than he’d originally thought, whether in love or other aspects of life.

“Do you _love_ love Linda?”

There’s no answer for that, either, because he _should_ , he knows he should, but, just like how he’s not _totally utterly happy_ with her, he doesn’t think he _love_ loves her. Does that make him a bad boyfriend?

Barry thinks back to something Dr. Wells once said when referring to how the Flash saving the day has made the people of Central City focus more on the spectacle and less on the actual crime being done in the city.

“ _Panem Et Circenses_.” Is his only response.

“Barry, I don’t really see how a Hunger Games reference helps right now.”

He chuckles at that. “It’s Latin. Doctor Wells says it all the time. _Bread and Circuses_. It’s when the Roman emperors used to use entertainment and food to distract the plebeians, _like myself_ , from how horribly they were really being treated. Nowadays, though, it means something more along the lines of something used to placate or…”

“Distract someone from a bad situation that they don’t want to focus on.” She finishes for him.

He finds himself smiling again. “How do you always do that?”

“Perfectly perfect, remember?” Felicity takes a deep breath, but then starts again. “So you’re saying that we’re just distracting ourselves?...”

“Maybe? I mean, I don’t know. Am I bad for saying that?”

“It depends on what you really mean by it.”

“I don’t know, do you?”

“No, not really.”

“Do you know what you’re going to do about it? Because, if you keep up the way you are, you’re going to end up walking into the Arrow Cave with a hickey on your neck and then they’re all going to _know_ something’s up.”

“Actually…”

“Don’t tell me you already did?”

“Maybe?”

“Felicity!”

“Roy teased me about it for a bit, and Laurel told me she was happy for me. I don’t think Thea noticed. I hope she didn’t. Imagine Oliver finding out from her….” Felicity pauses. “Barry… what if he doesn’t come back?”

He notices she’s dangerously close to reverting back to the way she was a month ago. “He’ll come back, Felicity. He always does.”

“Not always.”

“He _came back_ , Felicity.”

“But not the way I wanted him to.”

“It doesn’t really matter now, though, does it? You’re moving on, that should be the only thing that matters.”

“It should, though.” She replies, and then he knows in that moment that she’s talking more _about_ him than _to_ him, and that might make him stiffen if he didn’t know how absolutely, utterly, totally right she is.

(If only he was that certain about his feelings). (Well, he is, he just thinks admitting it would make him a horrible person) (because being slightly less-than totally, utterly perfect is better than being heartbroken because of unrequited love). (Except it might not be so unrequited). (He shouldn’t even go there).

“Bye Barry.” She finally says.

“Bye Felicity.”

He goes salsa dancing with Linda that night, but can’t help but wonder if its’ all just _bread and circuses_ , or if he actually loves her. (Well he knows he loves her) (he just might not love-love her).

.

.

.

Oliver comes back.

He says he’s been offered a position as the Heir to the Demon.

Nyssa is not happy about this.

Felicity is even less happy about this.

The next day, she asks Ray to be her date to Dig’s wedding.

The next day, they officially become an item.

The next day, Felicity decides, even if it’s just a happy distraction from a painful reality, she’s happy how things are turning out with Ray. (Just not utterly, totally happy). (Just like Barry).

(She's the opposite of happy about how  _everything else_ in her life is turning out) (especially the stuff related to her friends in masks).

 


	8. Tantalus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Is it really wrong when the person you're flirting with is your soulmate?  
> Barry and Felicity reflect on the right kind of wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _guess who's back? back again_  
>  The only problem I’m having this week is that Barry and Felicity cannot talk, because I have no idea if Barry going back in time and changing everything affects the Starling City timeline, or if Starling City exists in the version of the timeline after Barry goes back in time and changes things (if so, I wonder how things would be different in the version where Cisco dies). Still, that doesn’t mean the parallels won’t be angsty and obvious and heart-wrenching.  
> (also, did you guys see Felicity's bedroom eyes in this week's episode? like seriously, that girl was throwing caution to the wind) (I'M SO PUMPED FOR THE WEDDING)

Tantalus (Tantalize)  

_{to torment or tease (someone) with the sight or promise of something that is unobtainable} {Greek Mythology - most famous for his eternal punishment in Tartarus. He was made to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches, with the fruit ever eluding his grasp, and the water always receding before he could take a drink.}_

 

There is something to be said for the rush one gets when they’re doing something they shouldn’t.

Whether its sneaking out of your house in the middle of the night.

Talking your way out of trouble.

Or, you know, participating in vigilantism.

Adrenaline courses through veins, heart pumping, and its so addicting that its almost impossible to stop it.

But the effects are the strongest when the thing you’re doing is not only something you shouldn’t be doing, but something so tantalizing that you can’t help but do it.

 

They definitely shouldn’t be doing this here and now.

He definitely knows what Iris is doing.

(At least, he thinks he does) (but this is also the part of his brain that is convinced that Iris reciprocates his feelings).

But a little friendly competition between two friends is harmless.

Even if it means they ignore their respective dates just a tiny bit.

When Iris invites him and Linda to join her and Eddie, he is confused and a bit shocked, because there’s no way this could be a good idea.

The air is still rife with tension whenever him and Iris talk, and Linda and Iris are still on bad footing, and Eddie obviously guessed at one point that Barry had feelings for his girlfriend.

But they can’t talk about all that.

So they all fake smiles and say yes and pretend that this won’t be the most awkward thing ever.

(And Barry admits he’s lying to himself when he says he’s _not_ laying on the flirt with Linda a little heavier than usual because Iris is standing right now.)

At first it’s all shameless, and friendly, and everything.

But then things get back into the territory they were in before everything changed and he was struck by lightning.

Because Iris’ hands are suddenly on his face, wiping mustard off of it.

And he can play dumb as much as he wants.

But he can’t ignore the looks that cross Eddie and Linda’s faces.

(Well he can kind of ignore them) (because Iris’ touch is electric).

The date is cut short, and him and Eddie have to go, but Barry thinks it might be as well, because he’s getting addicted to the tension in the air that circulates around him and Iris the entire night, and that is _definitely_ not a good thing.

.

.

.

Felicity’s been making a lot of impulse decisions lately.

To be fair, most of them have worked out wonderfully.

(And by that she means Ray) (sleeping with Ray has worked out wonderfully for her) (and her stomach definitely agrees with the restaurants he’s been taking her to).

And despite the fact that she’s technically sleeping with her boss, the situation has never felt that wrong.

Until the moment Oliver Queen knocks on the door of her office while she is draped around Ray Palmer’s arm.

She jumps back like a freshman who’s terrified of getting in trouble jumps back from their date to homecoming when a teacher tells them they’re dancing too closely together.

Now it feels wrong.

And not a good kind of wrong either, she feels like she’s just been caught cheating, which is absolutely ridiculous, because Oliver made his decision, and she made hers.

(Truth be told, she’s kind of hoping for a jealous reaction) (and is slightly disappointed when she doesn’t get one). (Still, it means he’s respecting her decisions) (and she _really_ likes that).

Oliver doesn’t want to talk about her and Ray. He wants to talk about the reason he came to see her, which was research on the guy with his lips sewn shut.

He owns up to his mistakes with Lance, and if that doesn’t make her heart soar, she doesn’t know what does, because Oliver hasn’t been owning up to mistakes very much recently, and maybe if he admits he regrets this mistake, he’ll admit regretting others…

(That might be the reason she steps closer to him). (Might be the reason she grabs his arm). (Maybe).

She finds herself in the same position that she left him in when she walked away from him in the hospital all those months ago.

Being left alone by the one person you want to be alone with most in the world, and her arms still reach out for him, betraying her true feelings.

The only problem is, after Oliver leaves and Ray returns into the room, she realizes her shameless flirting has picked up right where it left off, and that should probably be concerning.

Maybe she wants to be a bad girl, though.

Maybe she wants to do the thing she shouldn’t.

Because she’s been the follow-the-rules-before-you-follow-your-gut girl for too long, and life’s too short for her not to follow her gut.

(Even if being with Ray was more of a practical decision than a gut one) (but she’s denying herself that for now) (because she needs this right now) (she needs one thing outside of the foundry that can make her feel like her life is going in a direction that she can control) (a direction where everyone around her isn’t always dying).

.

.

.

Iris’ words are the catalyst for everything. Barry forgets about Linda entirely, and that’s probably a bad thing.

(Who is he kidding?)(Its definitely a bad thing).

But a tsunami is heading towards the city and they all might die and Iris has just told him she returns his feelings and the timing could not be more perfect and this one bad thing has never felt so good.

He shouldn’t be as surprised as he is that Iris’ kiss is the most addictive, sweet, incredible thing he’s ever experienced, and he’s ran across water.

In most cultures, this would be considered cheating.

(Is it really cheating though, when its with your soulmate).

(Yes).

He might be addicted to her kiss.

The only problem, however, is the entire catalyst for this kiss even happening, because they’re all going to die if he doesn’t do something soon.

And so he reveals himself.

(Yet another thing that he really should not be doing).

The return of Iris’ trademark breathlessness when he changes into his Flash Suit sets his veins on fire with adrenaline and something else that tastes kind of like her kiss.

(But that might be because the only thing he can taste is her kiss) (and the only thing he can feel is her lips on his) (and the way he had to pulled away from her only to realize she had been biting his lip and _how hot was that_ )

If they all weren’t about to die, this might be the best day of his life.

And when he runs in front of the wall of water, he runs for her, and runs faster than he ever has before in his life, because what’s the point of running fast if he’s not about to save everything wonderful that he’s just gained?

And then the problem occurs.

Because, despite everything being wonderful and almost perfect for a few blissful seconds, he is now finding himself back where he was less than 24 hours before. And, if it had not been for his conversation with Cisco a week ago, he might be confused at the change in time and location, but he knows what has occurred, and it is beyond frustrating.

He is angry.

He is so incredibly angry.

Because, even though he should be excited, because _he just traveled in time_ , he is not, because he’s seen every movie involving time travel.

He’s read every book on time travel.

Hell, he’s even played every _video game_ on time travel, and he knows one wrong move and he could lose everything.

But that’s the thing about doing something you shouldn’t; once you have a taste, all you want is more, and damn the consequences.

So, with the taste of Iris’ possibly no-longer-existing kiss still on his tongue, he decides to screw it; he deserves to be happy.

And now he knows how she feels.

And if he’s not going to use this time travel to get her, tantalizing, addictive affection as soon as possible, then he doesn’t deserve it.

(And, of course he’s going to try and save Detective Singh too) (but Iris is top priority) (like she always has been).

He’s high on adrenaline and her kiss, and screw everything else; he’s going to salvage everything and do it like a hero.

.

.

.

When Diggle tells her about Oliver considering becoming Ra’s al Ghul, Felicity is equal parts terrified and angry.

When Diggle tells her about Oliver’s reasons for considering becoming Ra’s al Ghul, Felicity isn’t sure whether to be angry or frustrated or flattered.

_Because he still cares._

And of course she knew that.

(He’s not making it that discreet).

( _Don’t ask me to say I don’t love you_ )

( _And you know how I feel about her_ )

(The flat out _I love you_ ).

And she can’t say she wasn’t expecting some big, dramatic consequence based on the way Oliver’s been acting since he came back.

What is surprising, however, is her conversation with him about the subject, because he just seems so lost.

Before that happens, though, she feels the need to remind him that her being in a relationship doesn’t mean that she won’t still be here for Team Arrow every night that she can.

(Because she may not be able to choose Oliver Queen over Ray Palmer, but she sure as hell can choose the Arrow over Ray Palmer) (no question about that).

When she brings up the subject of him leaving them, Felicity feels herself tearing up, and normally she would hide her feelings on a subject like this, but she’s already gone through losing him once, and she can’t do that again, because she might just break this time.

And his number one priority is still the city and the people who live within it. Tommy. Sara. His mother. All casualties in a war to protect this city that he loves.

(It reminds her of why she fell in love with him in the first place).

Then he asks that question, the one that splits her soul in half because it hurts her so much that he feels this way: _I don’t know why I’m doing this anymore._

She wants to help him with everything, always has, since the moment she first met him, but she’s so lost right now, because _she can’t help him with this one._

And that’s painful.

Ridiculously painful.

(And she can’t help but throw in a dig that the only reason they’re not together is that he said they couldn’t be, because its funny in a bitter humor sort of way, and he needs a reminder that good things still come around) (a reminder that good things still _could_ come around).

 

A few hours later and he has figured out why he’s doing this, and it’s probably not a good thing that Oliver repeating her words to Captain Lance and saving the _entire_ Starling City police department despite them not actually giving a damn about him turns her on so much, but it does.

So maybe she lets out a tiny wolf whistle when he gets back into the foundry. (And maybe it has a bit to do with the fact that this is the first time she’s actually taken the time to appreciate how good he looks in green leather, because most of the time, the view has been blocked by her all-consuming rage towards him).

The pattern they fall into after that is so easy that she feels like its still last summer, and she knows she shouldn’t be doing this, knows she definitely shouldn’t be flirting with him, because she has a boyfriend, one who is crazily more emotionally stable than Oliver is, but then he says _thank you_ and _you were right_ and shivers are sent down her spine.

(And maybe its because this is how most of her fantasies have started since he came back and they started arguing) (because it means he’s reverting back to the man she knows and loves and is absolutely crazy about).

So if her eyes get a little hooded and her hips sway a little more than usual, then screw her (preferably on the med table, because that’s where most of the fantasies go after that) because this kind of wrong feels so, so right.

And then he basically tells her that she is the answer. That the words she told him all those years ago still hold resonance with him, and that that in itself is the reason he’s not going to become Ra’s al Ghul. (She can barely control the words coming out of her mouth about ‘most handsome’).

He’s not giving up on this yet.

(He’s not giving up on them yet).

She feels the need to remind him that she doesn’t need Ray to be happy, she just needs him, Oliver _and_ the Arrow in her life, whether its as a friend or something more than that.

His smile is everything.

And maybe she’s a little high on the unresolved sexual tension surrounding them, the tantalizing taste of doing something she shouldn’t.

She’s reminded that she shouldn’t when Ray calls.

She picks up the call.

After all, she still has a boyfriend, and if Oliver doesn’t want her to anymore, he’s got to give a little more commitment than shameless flirting, because, as she learned at the end of the summer, they are not the same thing.

Still, Dig’s wedding is next week, and, if he’s still really going for this, she might just convince him to dance with her.

Despite the comment that she doesn’t dance.

Now _that_ prospect is truly tantalizing.

 

 


	9. Golden Calf

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The world does not seem to be functioning normally anymore, and Barry and Felicity turn to each other to find a rock amidst a swirling sea of confusion and chaos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this is so late; i had written a lot for a totally different allusion before realizing it wasn't working, so i picked this one and had to start over, but i think it was worth it.  
> there are two tropes i love more than anything else in the world: wedding episodes and time travel, and i was lucky enough to get both this week (i’m still kind of in shock) so i don’t know if i can live up to the amazingness that was this week’s episodes, but i’m definitely willing to try.

Golden Calf

_{Book of Exodus} {Moses is up on Mt. Sinai receiving the 10 commandments, and, while he’s gone, the people make a calf out of gold and begin to worship it. Moses is so angry to see this that he breaks the tablets} {an idol that is worshipped even though it is not worthy of worship}_

Barry doesn’t understand.

Doctor Wells is supposed to be a mentor, a friend, the greatest scientific mind of the time. Except he’s not. Well, he is the last one, but not the first two.

At least, thats the dark place Barry’s mind has finally gone.

And it wouldn’t have been without the use of time travel.

Time travel, which Doctor Wells absolutely forbid him to talk about because it might rupture the space-time continuum yet again. Time travel, which messed everything up so badly that it took Caitlin and a hardly believable excuse about lightning psychosis to smooth everything over with Eddie and Iris, the two friends in his life that don’t know anything about his secret identity. (Thank god for Caitlin; he doesn’t know what he’d do without her). Time travel, which is so incredibly fascinating and so incredibly revealing at the same time, because Barry now knows secrets about all of his friends and family that he would not have known otherwise.

He knows Iris’ pushed down feelings. Knows her reaction to him being the Flash.

He knows Linda’s observations on his relationship with the girl he’s in love with. Knows the breakup would’ve come anyway, whether or not Barry admitted he still has feelings for Iris.

He knows Joe’s decision to not tell Iris about the Flash will come back to bite both of them. Knows some unthinkable circumstances call for unthinkable actions.

And then there’s the worst one of all. He knows Iris’ boss was writing an article that would expose Harrison Wells for what he truly was. Knows no one but him knew about this article in this timeline. Knows that now, somehow, impossibly, this man has ended up dead.

And when he went to go investigate the crime scene, the way he was killed seems even more impossible than the fact that he was killed.

So, despite all his actions to prevent the outcome, someone was killed anyways.

And there is only one person with the motive for this murder, and its the man Barry had idolized for years and years now. The man whose lifetime achievement had given him these incredible powers in the first place. The man who had pushed him to run harder, faster, who had protected him against anything and everything that had ever come into his life to hurt him.

(You know, everything but heartbreak) (but no one can protect you from that except for yourself).

Barry feels betrayed.

No, its more than that.

He feels angry and sad and betrayed and hurt. Oh so hurt. (And maybe some of that pain is a little bit left over from the pain he’d received when Iris flat out denied him). (Again).

So if he’s learned one thing from this time travel experience, its that people are not always what they seem. Even the people closest to him. Even the people he looks up to. (Even the people who he should trust the most).

Barry finds himself questioning the motives of the rest of the people who surround him in his everyday life.

(Because if Doctor Wells can be a complete psychopath, anyone can be). (Because if Doctor Wells, who’s done nothing but guide and nurture and inspire him can be just the kind of person Barry’s been fighting against since he got his powers, he doesn’t know how the world even works anymore). (To be fair, the world has changed the way it works, and he doubts even Albert Einstein could figure out the new laws of the universe).

Is Caitlin really as okay as she says she is, or is she one more tragedy away from breaking at the seams?

How much anger does Eddie have pent up behind that service-with-a-smile attitude and sunny disposition?

Why does he feel like something worse should’ve happened to Cisco in this timeline, and that its only a matter of time before it catches up to him?

How many other people in Barry Allen’s life could be a golden calf?

_(Never meet your heroes, right?)_

He isn’t sure who to trust anymore. Because Central City has somehow turned from a place full of sunshine and little crime to a place where killers run loose and betray your trust. In truth, its starting to look as dark as Starling City. (Maybe possibly darker). (At least in Starling City its easier to tell when someone is faking a smile).

Central City has turned out to be a place filled with insane amounts of evil under the facade of smiles and sunshine and coffee and colorfully-named meta-humans.

Central City has turned out to be the place that Barry saw it as after his mom died; a place where horrible things can happen, where someone’s life can turn entirely upside down, and the neighbors will smile smiles that don’t totally seem real, and pretend that life can go back to being the same as it was.

That’s the thing, though.

It can’t.

(Not with Wells). (Not with Iris). (Not with anyone). (Because Barry is no longer quite sure who to trust). (He trusts Joe, though; that’s why he’s been brought on board to this).

If only he could just tell someone about the things he saw in that other timeline. If only people could know the slowly-fading dream of a day that happened and then un-happened. The day that was so incredibly wonderful and horrible at the same time.

(Barry has a feeling Iris might not be so forgiving when she really finds out he’s the Flash).

(Barry has a feeling that Doctor Well’s reaction when finally confronted with the evidence against him will be even more terrifying than the prospect of a tsunami looming over the city).

(Barry has a horrible, horrible feeling, and he’s not quite sure what he can do to make it go away).

But he can’t.

So instead, he lies awake at night, staring at the same ceiling he’d stare at as a boy, the first time that he realized that the world was a lot darker than it pretended to be. He tries to remember in vivid detail every moment of the day that never happened. Every smell and sight and taste of the day lost in time.

The only thing, however, is he can no longer quite recall the taste of Iris’ chapstick. He knows it was something he wouldn’t have expected. Something that was surprising, but oh-so her, and _how could he forget something that important?_

How could the memory of Felicity Smoak’s kiss be more vivid in his mind than the memory of the kiss with the girl he’s been in love with for his entire life?

(He knows why). (Its because his mind knows that that kiss never really happened). (Except it did). (But only to him). (And is it really a kiss when it only happened to one person?) (no).

Something was wrong with Caitlin’s voice on the comms that day. Something he cannot quite decipher. Something that makes the bad feeling in his stomach grow even more.

.

.

.

Felicity’s life flashes before her eyes.

Literally.

How sad is it that she can say that this is not the first time this has happened.

( _How many times has someone held a gun to her head or a knife to her throat?_ ) (She could say she doesn’t know) (but she remembers them all). (But she’d never expected an arrow to be shot at her head).

And Ray jumps in front of it.

Selfless, selfless Ray Palmer.

God, he was in no way perfect, but he loved her, and for now, that was enough.

(Was it everything she wanted and needed and saw in her life and future?) (no). (Was it everything she craved and desired when she closed her eyes and allowed herself to imagine a different scenario?) (no.) (But it was enough). (Enough to get her to sleep at night) (enough to keep a smile on her face during the day) (enough to keep her from falling to pieces).

Its not the first time that day that she’s seen a future that is not filled with _enough_ , but instead filled with _entirety_ and _infinity_ and _everything she wants._

The other time was at Diggle and Lyla’s wedding.

The other time was when she caught the bouquet.

When that silky organization of white flowers had flown at her face and landed in her arms like it was a rainbow and she was the pot of gold at the end of it, when she’d caught it, despite so many other highly-trained-for-combat women with surely better reflexes than her also trying to do the same, she’d seen something she hadn’t realized she’d been needing until that very moment.

Sure, she’d fantasized about Oliver.

Domestically, of course.

(Although she would be lying if she’d said she hadn’t in other ways too).

But it had always been a boyfriend-girlfriend situation.

Never anything past living together.

Because anything else would be… well… unthinkable.

Except she was thinking it.

She saw a gorgeous silver ring without any jewels, but carved intricately with arrowhead designs.

She saw a white dress that hugged her curves and lace sleeves.

She saw bridesmaids in red because _it was red._

She saw Thea and Roy and Diggle and Lyla and Laurel and baby Sara and Barry and Caitlin and Cisco and Iris and her mother and everyone she cared about in the audience.

Even Ray.

(Although, she’s not totally sure why he’s there).

Even Nyssa.

(Which confuses her even more).

But it was what she felt that got her.

She felt absolute, total, utter happiness. A feeling she had only felt a few times in her life. And she’d be lying if she said Oliver hadn’t been the cause of at least one of those.

(How could she ever think she could spend the rest of her life without him?).

Now it is a different scene.

There is no wedding or bouquet, or bridesmaids all dressed in red. There is none of that, and yet, somehow there is everything.

Because she knows she needs this in her life.

Because she knows enough is not really enough.

Because right as she’s about to die, she sees a future, one in which Oliver gets his head out of his ass and she is with him and there are kisses on cheeks and early morning coffees and late nights in the foundry with a baby in a cradle beside her computers that is decidedly not Sara, and the world being okay with revealed secret identities.

Because she can’t even begin to fathom a world in which she does not end up with all of that.

And then Ray Palmer jumps in front of her, effectively saving her life from what would be a deathblow.

And its not a deathblow for him, but it almost is, and they rush him to the hospital. And Felicity remembers why enough is enough, at least for now.

Because she can’t focus on a future with someone other than Ray for now. (And by someone she means Oliver, because if her conversation with him earlier proved anything it is that he has somehow gotten his head even _further_ up his colon).

She needs to be okay with enough for now.

She needs to be okay with the man who _just took an arrow for her._

She needs to focus on the now.

The now, which involves screaming and headaches and blurry vision and ambulances and blood ( _oh god, so much blood_ ) is not a fun place to be. But its where she needs to be. She needs to be at Ray’s side, because, despite how much he’s not held up his word with her these past few days, she can’t lose him too. She’s already lost her father. And Cooper. (And even Oliver, its seemed, for a while now, because he’s still not fully there). Truth be told, she doesn’t know how she could possibly stay together if Ray died on her.

So she holds his hand in the ambulance, trying to hold herself together because she’s scared that, if she breaks, this time she’ll fracture permanently.

Focus.

Breathe.

Focus on the details.

So she does.

She focuses on the dark of Ray’s hair, matted with sweat, and the way it meets his too-pale skin.

She focuses on his fluttering eyes and the limp grasp on her hand.

She even lets her mind wander to the scarlet liquid pouring from his side, not being entirely soaked up by the gauze that the paramedics have put on him.

It helps her calm her breathing a bit, despite scaring her almost to death because _that arrow was meant for her._

Later on, she’ll fall asleep in the waiting room, exhausted and covered in tears.

But for now, she squeezes Ray’s hand tight and tries not to think about the one word she’s let slip out in the past week that she currently wishes she hadn’t.

_(Yes)._

(How can he love her enough to take an arrow for her after that?)

Felicity cannot deserve him. Despite all his faults, Ray Palmer has only been touched by the little finger of tragedy, while Felicity has looked into death’s face and kissed it. Multiple times.

She would’ve been okay with anyone else taking the blow for her.

Roy.

Diggle.

Even Laurel.

(And especially Oliver). (Because that was what they did) (they took unbearable blows to keep each other safe and sane). (If Oliver was the one bleeding out in front of her, it would just be another Wednesday night). (But its not; its Ray, Ray who still saw the world in black and white, not understanding the grey area that consumed her nightly activities. In a way, he reminds her of who she was before she joined this crusade.)

(That person does not deserve to be given the punishment meant for someone else).

If this world were not the real one that she knows and loves, the one in which science tells her a dark deed will not darken your heart, Felicity would say her heart is ridden with spots of black, and Ray has just one.

He’s too good for her.

And she knows thats not true. In all reality, she’s probably too good for him, at least, thats what everyone keeps telling her: she’s too good to be happy. _You’re too pure to be happy, Felicity. You need to be protected from this evil, evil world at all costs, Felicity._

Little do they all know, she learned how dark the world really was at an age far younger than Oliver Queen was when he discovered it.

Actually, the only person who’s found darkness in their life at an age young enough to even compare with Felicity is Thea. And that is not a comparison she wants to make, because the younger Queen often seems more innocent than Felicity herself, despite being the one who took Sara Lance away from this world.

Felicity’s seen more darkness in her lifetime than most people do.

But still, the team refuses to acknowledge that. Maybe its because she’s revealed even less about her past than Oliver has, and he’s the one who never talks. Maybe its because they know her father left, but not how or why or the amount of time her mother spent crying afterwards.

Maybe its because she puts on a smile and a bright color, and they all treat her like some exotic, almost-extinct flower.

They forget that she has seen all that they have since she joined this.

Ray is the same.

Ironically, the man with a heart of a boy-scout, the one who just took an arrow for her, sees the girl who could ruin his life in less than three minutes, the girl who has seen more death in the past three years than he will ever see, as a naive young lady, blinded by passion and ambition and a quest for righteousness.

Maybe if he would get up from his projects long enough to look in the mirror, he would realize he’s reflected all of his own faults onto his image of her.

(God, he’s just like she used to be). (He does not deserve to be bleeding out in an ambulance).

It should be her lying there.

_(And she’s starting to think like Oliver)._

They all see her as an idol, a marble statue with no self defense mechanisms. She isn’t worthy of this praise. She isn’t worthy of being protected at all costs.

Maybe she just wants to be happy.

Maybe being happy is better than being safe.

.

.

.

Felicity calls a day later than she usually does, but Barry doesn’t blame her. He’s seen the news; the Arrow is killing again, and someone who looks like Iron Man is roaming the streets. Starling City’s mayor was just assassinated, and Ray Palmer is in the hospital nursing an arrow wound.

“It was meant for me.” She tells him. “Oliver’s not the one killing these people.”

Barry doesn’t know whether or not he should believe her. He doesn’t know what to believe anymore.

He tells her so.

“Nothing has made sense for me lately. Everyone is exactly who they say they aren’t. My gut has never been more wrong before.”

“Do you know what brought about this change?”

“I don’t know anything anymore.”

“Me neither.”

She seems just as lost and confused and lonely as him, and, not for the first time either, Barry wishes they could just go back to last winter, when promises were made that were not kept. Promises of being on time for dates that never happened. Promises of dancing and smiling and nerd-talk. Hopes of moving on with someone you might actually have a chance with. What happened to those innocent kids who were so desperate for an out in the game of unrequited love that they convinced themselves they were falling for someone because they spoke the same language as them?

“Barry, do you think I’m a good person?”

“If you’re not a good person, than the world is somehow even _more_ messed up than I’d thought.”

“But do you think I’m a good enough person that a civilian should die to protect me?”

“Thats the thing about our crusades, Felicity; we do this to protect the people in our cities, not the other way around.”

“I just feel like it shouldn’t have happened this way.”

“I know the feeling.”

“How’s Linda?”

“We broke up, actually. We’re going to still be friends, though.”

“Seems to be quite the habit with you.”

“Yeah.”

“You know its supposed to work friends-to-lovers, not the other way around, right?”

“You know life is not a tv-show, Felicity.”

“If only it could be.” She’s silent for a moment before continuing. “I would invite you over, and prove to you how much better life would be as a tv-show, but my mom’s staying over, and I think if I introduce her to another vigilante she might have a heart attack.”

“Normally, I’d say I’m not a vigilante, but…”

“Nothing makes sense anymore.”

She always seems to know him so well. If they could’ve fallen in love with each other, they could’ve been so much happier at this point. But they didn’t. And now they’re both screwed.

She tells him how Ray Palmer guessed at her feelings for Oliver.

He tells her about Linda Park guessed at his feelings for Iris.

Maybe if they could’ve rebounded with each other, they wouldn’t have felt so much like they were betraying everybody.

(Maybe they wouldn’t have felt so much like everyone was betraying them).

Barry Allen loves Felicity Smoak.

But not in the way that the world seems to want him to.

And, despite what she’s told him, he would’ve taken that arrow for her too. Despite what she believes about the darkness in her heart (she sounds so much like Oliver right now that its almost at a soulmate-level), Felicity Smoak deserves to be protected.

Not at the cost of a civilian.

But at the cost of a hero.

And, despite him not quite believing that Felicity really wants to be with Ray and not Oliver, Barry has to admit that saving Felicity Smoak makes anyone a hero in his book.

“Bye, Barry.”

“Bye, Felicity.”

Barry wonders what happened to her during the day that never happened. He hopes things worked out, but, with his luck, he’s messed things up over in Starling City too.

Maybe he’s the reason she’d gotten an arrow shot at her.

(Now he’s the one sounding like Oliver).

Joe calls soon after Felicity hangs up, and Barry returns to his investigation against Wells, with the bad feeling in his stomach slightly lessened, because Felicity, even though she is just as confused with the world right now as he is, is exactly as he remembers her.

Its nice to have a constant in his life again.

Then again, they always were perfectly perfect for each other


	10. Pygmalion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The arrest of the Arrow brings both Barry and Felicity tremendous amounts of fear and pain as they struggle to contain their emotions amidst a storm of police tape and people who are not what they seem.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHO SAW THAT PROMO? This chapter is a bit late solely because i was incapacitated for hours. Hopefully this will satisfy you all until Arrow and the Flash come back and we get some Barry and Felicity scenes. (Which will be the week of my birthday if any of you were wondering).

Pygmalion

_{someone (usually a male) who tries to fashion someone into the person he desires} {from a myth adapted into a play by George Bernard Shaw; a womanhating sculptor who makes a female figure of ivory who Aphrodite brings to life for him}_

Oliver Queen is the Arrow.

Thats what the headline reads on the television.

Barry tries as hard as he can to not look up at the flat screen that hangs in the precinct. Tries not to accept his own inevitable fate. Tries not to think about the things that have befallen his friends in Starling City.

Because if he looks, he’ll only blame himself. He’ll only think of all the ways this could’ve been avoided if he would have just stuck with the original timeline. All of this is his fault.

(Maybe self-loathing and blaming yourself is a side effect of this hero thing) (along with lying to everyone you care about) (along with having to force a smile to the people you hate) (along with wishing that just once the world would give you a break). (He’s already heading down the same path as Oliver) (maybe he’ll be the one whose identity is revealed and who gets arrested next). (Would the citizens of Central City really arrest the Flash?)

Barry can’t even watch the screen.

He doesn’t wait to hear his co-workers comments, doesn’t wait for any of them to remember that _hey, aren’t you friends with Oliver Queen_ and _did you know he was the Arrow?_

He rushes up the stairs to the board where his mother’s mom’s case used to sit. The board that now contains the terrifying mystery of the man who is Harrison Wells.

And he would (should) run over to Starling and get the poor guy out of there, but he knows if Oliver allowed himself to be arrested, it probably means he turned himself in. And Barry’s not quite sure how to deal with that. (Because he may well be on the path to becoming just like his tortured friend, but he does not know how his mind works).

No one comes up for a few minutes, and even though Barry tries to study his board, he is practically eaten up by feelings of guilt and dread and he’s just so _tired._

He just wants to go back to the fall when everything made sense and was wonderful and he didn’t run through walls and change time and he didn’t worry every time he heard the words “Starling City” on television.

And then Eddie comes up.

And maybe Barry is a little glad that he doesn’t have to rush to cover his board. And maybe Barry enjoys having a friend around his own age outside of the S.T.A.R. Labs crew to talk to about this sort of thing.

And maybe Barry forgets that Eddie doesn’t know that Barry’s known Oliver Queen is the Arrow for years. And maybe when he pulls his head out of his hands and looks up into the other man’s eyes he realizes that Eddie didn’t know the connection before, but he sure as hell does now. And maybe Eddie is just too good of a person to let someone who feels as broken as Barry does right now get by without a hug.

So, for the second time in as many weeks, Barry finds himself nearly crushed by a friend that he never thought he’d had.

“You knew he was it, didn’t you?” Eddie asks later, as they sit down together, Barry facing away from his board because he still can’t bring himself to look at it. “I mean, the Flash and the Arrow did work together a few times in the fall.”

“Yeah. But I knew before then. When I first went to Starling. He’s the reason I wanted to do what I do. But now, I don’t know anymore. I don’t even know what I’m doing.” He replies, motioning to the board plastered with pictures of Harrison Wells.

There’s the picture of him with Caitlin and Cisco and Wells in the Flash suit on the board, the one he still has as his phone background. Barry remembers when they took it, back when everything seemed so much simpler.

And, he knows its probably even less wise to keep evidence of his secret identity in the police station, but he does so anyway, because maybe he’s tired of keeping all these secrets from the people he loves. (Especially Iris).

Because he doesn’t want to end up like Oliver.

Sure, Central City may love the Flash now, but Starling City loved the Arrow too, and now they’re trying to incarcerate him.

It would be better to let everyone know while he’s at a high point and they can still look him in the eye with love and pride and all of the little happy things that make Barry’s heart soar. (Like the way his father looked at him when he saved him).

(A feat which wouldn’t have been possible without Dr. Wells talking him through running through walls).

He remembers Wells’ reluctance for him to work with the Arrow. His reluctance for Barry to be anything other than whatever it is he’s been molding him into, piece by piece.

(Maybe the reason that Barry feels like he’s free-falling is because one of his mentors turns out to be a psychopath and the other one is currently arrested and Barry doesn’t want to head down either of those paths).

He wishes he could talk to Iris about this.

She’s always been good at guiding him, even in a time of his life before Wells and Oliver were a large part of him. Iris had helped him remember why it is he fights.

And he doesn’t want it to be anything more than a friendly talk.

He can’t think about it being anything more than that; not when her boyfriend is the only one so far who’s come to see if he’s okay.

Barry knows the others would be here if they could. But Eddie was the closest, and now that he knows, he is compassionate enough to feel empathy for a man who has broken the law a billion times, despite the fact that he himself is a detective.

Barry wishes he was as sure of himself and who he was as Eddie is.

How did it happen that he ended up with two blonde rays of sunshine as his friends?

_Oh god, Felicity._

He’d almost forgotten about her.

He’d been so caught up in his anger over Wells and the guilt that was slowly eating him up inside that he had forgotten the TV reporter mentioning that Ray Palmer had been shot by an arrow.

Because Doctor Wells may now lack every bit of compassion, but Barry is not so far gone yet that he does.

.

.

.

_(I love you)._

Its not the first time that Felicity has heard those words. Far from it. She’s been told the three little words more times in the past few months than she had in the past three years.

Its a fate most teenage girls dream of. A fate Felicity would rather have avoided.

Felicity blanches.

Because Ray is looking at her with such sincerity, like she is his world and his light, despite the fact that just a few hours ago he didn’t trust her or believe her. Because this guy who is perfect for her on paper just told her he loved her and suddenly all of this feels real.

Maybe it should’ve felt real earlier. After the first date. After they went to Dig and Lyla’s wedding together. After the tabloids started picking up on the fact that the girl they’d once suspected was dating Oliver Queen is, in fact, dating the man who took over his company.

But it didn’t. Nothing about this felt real until this very moment, when he’s staring into her eyes and she can’t bring herself to say that she loves him back because _it just wouldn’t be true._

_(Thats a really nice thing to say)._

God, she’s so stupid.

She practically scurries out of the room as fast as she can, fast-talking and changing the topic so rapidly that she’s sure he cannot keep up so he won’t notice that she’s not saying it back, a tactic that she picked up in grade school, when she would talk her way out of trouble with both teachers and bullies.

She has to catch her breath when she gets out in the hallway.

_(I love you)._

Felicity isn’t ready to be loved. (At least not by him). She isn’t ready to choose, really truly decide something as important as how her heart feels.

(The only thing is, she knows how her heart feels).

(Her heart feels like its being torn apart from the inside by things as small as Ray’s nanotech). (Her heart feels like its freezing to death in a sauna). (Her heart feels like its drowning in a desert). (Her heart doesn’t make much sense nowadays).

(Her heart does not belong to the man who just told her he loved her).

She doesn’t know anything anymore.

And she has been saying that for weeks upon weeks. Its frustrating, and disorienting, because she used to know things so clearly. She used to know the way the world worked. She used to know the way her heart felt. She used to know what she was fighting for. She used to know who she trusted and who she didn’t. She used to know that if something was perfect it was too good to be true.

_(I know two things)._

_(You are not alone)._

_(And I believe in you)._

Felicity used to know things.

She doesn’t anymore.

Her mother does though.

Her beautiful, kind mother, whose heart has always been in the right place even if her intentions were a little misguided. The amazing blonde woman in the yellow dress who is the embodiment of sunshine, and who Felicity thinks she might have inherited her tendency to say inappropriate things from because _hospital sex? really mom?_

Her mother knows things. Donna Smoak has known where Felicity’s heart has lied these past few months, despite the fact that she herself couldn’t find it.

_(I knew it in five)._

How are her feelings so clear that everybody but her can see them? Especially when, as she tries to look inside her heart, all she can see are muddled swirls of color and love and _feelings_ that don’t have names attached to them.

Red and blue circling each other in an endless cycle that reminds her of the ying-yang symbol.

(She doesn’t know what there being more red than blue there means). (And maybe she’s too distracted to think about it because she’s absolutely drowning in her feelings).

Then she rushes to the precinct. Because Oliver’s turned himself in, and she can barely believe it. And then he’s looking at her like he always does - like she’s his whole world, except one from an alternate dimension that he can only look into at not touch. He looks at her like she’s his lifeline and his light and his everything, except she’s not his, and they both know it.

He’s looking at her the way he had when he’d told her he loved her.

Both times.

_(I love you)._

_(Do you understand?)_

The only thing is she doesn’t understand. She doesn’t understand any of this because _nothing makes sense anymore._ She doesn’t understand her feelings. She doesn’t understand Lance’s sudden vendetta. She doesn’t understand why the police are using _Ra’s al fucking Ghul_ as a reliable source. She doesn’t understand any of this at all.

But she does understand the way he’s looking at her.

And its making her think heavenly thoughts. Thoughts that involve things that should definitely probably not be thought in a police station in a room full of people.

_(I love you)._

She’s really thinking about saying it.

_(I love you)._

Because the way he’s looking at her right now.

_(I love you)._

Is the way she knows she’s been looking at him since the moment they met.

_(I love you)._

And she doesn’t want to do it.

_(I love you)._

When they’re separated by a glass panel with a guard watching to make sure he doesn’t attack her.

_(I love you)._

And for a moment, she doesn’t care whether or not she’s with Ray. She doesn’t care about anything in the world other than the two of them, because he’s willing to sacrifice himself for them (for her) again, no questions asked. He’s willing to possibly face the death penalty just so none of Team Arrow will be questioned by the police or the media or a lawyer over this matter ever. She nearly breaks down at the realization that he’s blaming himself for all of this again, like she didn’t willingly jump on board. Like all of this wasn’t her choice.

He’s taking her choice out of the matter again. Shutting himself out from her. And, for a moment, she just wants to take control of the situation. She wants to get her control back before they’re separated forever.

_(I love you)._

But she doesn’t.

Felicity doesn’t ask the rest of them to clear the room, she doesn’t bring up anything other than _what were you thinking_ and _please say you have a brilliant plan._ She barrels past Oliver’s question of Ray because thinking about Ray makes her think about the _I love you_ that she’s trying to keep from spilling past her lips.

Felicity doesn’t come up with a plan to get him out or free him or give the police another target. Roy’s the one who does that. Roy’s the one who sacrifices himself for the good of the city, and Felicity doesn’t try to stop him.

To be fair, he never tells the rest of them what he’s planning either. Just says he’s going to check on Thea at Verdant, and, despite the fact that Felicity’s become quite the expert on picking up lies since she joined this crusade, she doesn’t try to stop him.

Because at least he has a plan.

And she can’t be the one to dress up in green leather and give herself up.

Because those leather pants are too tight for that to be believable.

And she doesn’t know what else to do.

She doesn’t know anything anymore.

_(I know two things)._

_(I will do whatever -whatever- it takes to save my sister)._

_(And the second thing?)._

_(I love you)._

She wishes she could say it back. Because her feelings may be muddled, but she knows which of the two men she’s actually contemplated revealing these feelings to.

Even if he won’t act on his anymore. Even if he makes excuses upon excuses because he thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy. Despite the fact that he is currently under police custody.

Felicity’s made her choice. (In reality, she made it long before Ray ever came into her life).

Because Ray Palmer may be perfect for her on paper, in the way that Barry Allen is perfect for her, but Oliver Queen is the one that sets her soul on fire and makes her mind turn into a tornado of swirling emotions.

Because she’s been a complete _Pygmalion_ , trying to make Ray into the man she’s in love with in one last attempt to keep herself from finally falling.

Ironic that his declaration is what made her let go of the branch.

.

.

.

Iris has been asked to interview the Flash on his thoughts on Oliver Queen’s reveal as the Arrow, only for it to be revealed that he is not the Arrow, and that title belongs to Roy Harper.

The city wants to know how one vigilante is reacting to another vigilante’s capture.

Especially since the Arrow and the Flash have worked together in the past.

Barry has asked Eddie not to tell anyone that the police’s first thought was right and that Oliver Queen is, indeed, the Arrow. His new friend is pretty good at keeping secrets.

So here they stand, face to face at Jitters for the second time that week, and Barry is trying to not let his feelings of self-doubt and sadness come across in his interview.

Because the Flash is supposed to be suave and confident and hard to shake and a red blur of a man of mystery.

But Iris sees through him anyways. Like she always has been able to, even before he started running around the city in a red suit.

(Maybe he really wants her to know). (Maybe that’s why he’s not really hiding that picture of him in the Flash suit on his board in the precinct). (Because its not really his fault if she finds it herself).

“You were more than just partners-in-heroism, weren’t you?” Iris asks, an empathetic smile on her face.

For a second, Barry thinks she’s asking if he was _involved_ with the Arrow, and he tries to keep himself from making that choking sound he makes when he’s shocked, because Iris _knows_ that sound. (She was the first one to ever point it out).

“We - we were friends, yes.”

“I’m sorry.” Iris puts her hand on his shoulder as a gesture of comfort and, for a second, Barry can’t breathe. “This must be hard for you.”

“Y-yeah.” He manages. “The Arrow’s arrest makes me wonder if Central City will turn on me as well.”

“Flash,” she starts, using the voice she always uses to comfort him as Barry, and for a moment he wonders if she knows. “You’re not the type to kill.”

“He isn’t either.”

“I can’t put that in my article.”

“I know. I just - no one believes me when I tell them. He’s a good guy, maybe a little messed up, but his heart is in the right place. He’s the reason I wanted to start all of this,” he motions to his suit, “in the first place.”

“I believe you.”

Those might be the most comforting words he’s heard all day.

Because Caitlin and Cisco and Joe may know that the police have the wrong man, but they don’t know the way that Barry knows in his gut that Oliver is not the one responsible for these murders. Because the only person he who would understand right now is Felicity, and he doesn’t know if he should call her, because she might be in the hospital or a jail cell or really anywhere where she can’t talk and if she can’t talk to him about this he might dissipate.

Because there’s no way Iris can understand.

But at least she believes him. (Believes in him). Like she always has.

Not for the first time that night, Barry wonders if she’s figured it out, because her latest conversations with the Flash have taken on the air of the ones she has with him without the mask on.

He thinks it might not be so bad.

It wouldn’t be that bad if he wasn’t the statue to Wells’ Pygmalion.

It wouldn’t be that bad if Dr. Wells hadn’t spent the past six months molding him into a weapon of his own creation.

It wouldn’t be that bad if he wasn’t too unpredictable and dangerous for him to even consider letting Iris into this world.

He doesn’t want to hurt her.

He’d rather have her hate him than have her be hurt because of what he is.

So Barry doesn’t tell her.

He races out of Jitters once Iris is done with her questions, leaves her standing in the dust probably wondering whether or not she has a friend in this meta-human. Probably wondering if she can trust someone who was friends with a known killer.

And then he stops when he gets home.

And then he decides if he doesn’t at least _try_ to check in on Felicity, then he’s the worst best friend ever.

So he does.

.

.

.

Its in the silence of Dig’s apartment, after Roy’s left and its just the two of them and they’re avoiding the news because they don’t want to know any more bad things about Oliver’s arrest that Felicity’s phone rings.

And its Barry.

Of course its Barry. He’s probably worried out of his mind right now because he has no idea what is going on here.

Felicity doesn’t want to tell him half of what's going on.

But she picks up anyway, because, in a city full of crime and hatred, its nice to hear a friendly voice. And she can’t talk about the arrest or Roy or Oliver or anything like that right now, so she goes back to the other most important event of the night.

“Barry, how obvious am I?”

“Well, you’re not that inconspicuous with the signature blonde ponytail and the brightly-colored outfits, but if you need to get out of Starling I’m sure I can race you over here and you can hide out until this whole thing dies down and I promise Joe and Eddie won’t arrest you because they trust me that…”

“No, no. Not about that.”

“Oh.” He pauses for a second, sounding relieved. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Well not fine. I’m not arrested. Or being hunted by the police. And Ray’s okay too. At least, I think he is since he kind of told me he loved me and then I panicked and made a comment about jell-o and backed out of there as fast as I could and then my mom told me she could tell I was in love with Oliver in five seconds and-”

“Felicity-”

“What?” She stops short, realizing that she may have rambled on too much for Barry to follow. Her high nerves must have made her mouth move extra fast today.

“You said you’re in love with him.”

And its not like he didn’t know. He’s always known. Ever since he first met both of them. Just like the way she’d always known he’s in love with Iris. They’d just both never actually said it. It was an unspoken agreement, like the one that says they should be perfect for each other but aren’t. Like the one that says they’re always be there for each other. Like the one that says one will call the other once a week and just share things because there aren’t many people in either of their lives that they can just _vent_ to.

It sounds strange admitting it.

(Well, no). (It sounds _right_ ). (And that terrifies her).

“Oh-” She peeps out.

“That was the first time you’ve ever said that, isn’t it?”

“Um-”

“Its not like I didn’t already know or anything. So yes, you are pretty obvious. But its only because I know you so well, perfectly perfect and all that…”

This time, Barry’s the one rambling.

“And I know you probably didn’t mean to say it, so I can forget about it if you want…”

“Don’t.” Felicity interjects. Suddenly confident in her words. “I meant it. I mean, I didn’t mean to say it, but I meant it.”

She then realizes Diggle is smirking at her. She’d forgotten he was still in the room; she’s so used to going to this other sort of dimension when she talks to Barry on the phone, so used to being alone and having no one else listen that it surprises her to find that he’s heard her confession.

“Its good to finally hear you admit it.”

“I don’t know. The timing couldn’t possibly be worse.”

“How’s Ray?”

“He’s fine.” Felicity quickly brushes past the subject. “I, on the other hand, am not. I don’t know what to do or what to think or whether or not Oliver is going to be okay or whether or not _anyone_ is going to be okay.”

“Hey, things are going to work out.” Barry sounds so sure about this. But he _can’t_ be, not when things are so dark in Central City. Not when she knows about Wells and the time travel and the complete and utter path of destruction lying ahead of him.

“How can you be so sure?”

“I can’t. But sometimes it helps for someone to just tell you that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. Is it helping?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Thats okay.”

“How are things on your end?”

And she listens to Barry explain to her about Eddie and Iris and the interview and his gut feeling that he needs to tell her before its too late but can’t because he’s afraid that Wells has turned him into a weapon waiting to be unsheathed.

It hurts her, because it sounds so much like Oliver. Oliver, who is currently sitting in a jail cell.

“Barry, I know you look up to Oliver, but _please_ don’t become as closed off as him. You need people in your life that don’t wear masks.”

She knows she’s echoing Sara’s break up speech to him. Knows thats only because thats the last time she remembers coming to this revelation that she is still totally, infinitely in love with Oliver Queen. But its good advice nevertheless, and, despite the fact that Barry never got to meet Sara, Felicity is sure they would’ve gotten along great.

“So you’re saying I should tell Iris.”

“I’m saying Oliver could’ve avoided this situation if he’d been more open with the people he cares about what he does at night. He may not be the best role model, but you can still learn from his mistakes.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“Please do, because, Barry, I can’t lose you too.”

“I know.”

And she knows he’s remembering the way she shut him out after she’d found out Oliver died. The way she’d said she didn’t want to help him out if he was just going to go the way all the heroes in her life had. She doesn’t regret that. Losing Oliver would be the final straw, but losing Barry would be rubbing salt into a fast-flowing wound.

“Be careful.”

“I will.”

“Bye, Barry.”

“Bye, Felicity.”

The second she hangs up, she gets another call. This time from Oliver, which she’d thought would be impossible. _What was going on?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i've ended it like this because i'm not sure how they're going to have Diggle and Felicity find out that Roy has turned himself in as the Arrow, and I'm trying to keep this as in-canon as possible (you know, except for the time travel chapter; that one's just pure canon divergence). TELL ME YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT THE EPISODE AND THE NEW PROMO


	11. Janus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Barry and Felicity see each other face to face for the first time in months, and prove once again to know each other inside-out. (Follows Flash 1x18 with a bit of Arrow 1x19 at the end)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well I got not one asks but two on tumblr asking when this would be updated yesterday, so i'm assuming the return of barricity to our screens has made this a high-demand fic. also, i think this may be the longest chapter yet. ALSO THAT EP PROVED THIS FIC RIGHT IN SO MANY WAYS THAT IT ACTUALLY MADE ME SCREAM MULTIPLE TIMES SO THATS PRETTY COOL GUESS WHAT GUYS THIS FIC IS STILL IN-CANON (you know, except for that time travel chapter that no one talks about)

Janus

_{roman mythology: god of gates and doorways, patron of January, has two faces, and sees into the future and past} {refers to positives & negatives, wisdom & knowledge, or when someone is being two-faced, hypocritical, or having duality}_

 

So many choices to be made.

Whether or not to tell Caitlin and Cisco that Wells is the Reverse Flash.

Whether or not to let Iris in on the Flash secret against Joe’s will.

Whether or not to tell Felicity, who he has told everything, exactly why he is so upset that she’s brought Ray into all of this (and, despite how she jokes, its not because he’s jealous) (not really, anyway).

The god of doorways is staring him straight in the face and asking him to make a choice.

But its kind of hard to make a choice when the world is staring you in the face and not making any sense whatsoever. And the one person who is supposed to be his twin pillar, the one person who has always made sense in this storm of chaos in confusion, his one constant companion, is acting like a totally different person.

(Well not totally) (but its pretty close).

Because she’s draped around her new boyfriend’s arm in a way Barry has never seen her (and he’s seen her act practically married to someone she wasn’t even dating). Because that innuendo was just a bit too forced for it to be a real Felicity slip-up. Because all he needs right now is his best friend (and not the one he’s constantly lying to) and she is nowhere to be found.

(Again, not totally true). (She’s there) (in the swing of the ponytail) (in the desire to help people) (in the way she notices right away that he’s feeling bad and suggests they go out and get coffee and leave Cisco and Ray to work on the suit).

And then they’re in that coffee shop together. Jitters. And then he sees the cracked porcelain facade she’s been carrying around fall to pieces and suddenly he has his best friend back (well, his best friend that isn’t Iris, but that’s beside the point). And she asks him what’s wrong. And he’s been getting used to hearing her voice for months now, but this is the first time that they’ve talked, like actually talked face-to-face without one of them breaking down crying. (Even though he feels like he might be on the verge of doing just that any second).

And she comments about it. The mood and brood, that is. And he tries to deflect, apologizing, but she sees right through him like she always does, because they are two identical pieces of a puzzle. She asks if he’s upset because she told Ray his secret, but he’s not upset about that; she did ask him first, and he’s got too much on his plate right now to really worry that much about whether or not Ray Palmer knows his secret. If he’s trustworthy enough for Oliver, he’s trustworthy enough for him.

And he’s about to tell her the truth, he really is, but then Eddie comes along asking about another one of the choices that Barry needs to make and Barry is reminded that a guy he just met today knows he’s the Flash and the complete love of his life does not and wow this is really screwed up.

And the worst part is that he’d thought he’d _told her_. But maybe he forgets that, despite how alike they are, they cannot read each other’s minds, and n _othing makes sense anymore_ is not the same thing as _my used-to-be-hero turns out to be the man who murdered my mom._

But he didn’t. And now she doesn’t know. And now he can’t tell her. And he can’t tell Iris and that kind of sucks, and he agrees with Eddie when the other blonde asks Felicity how she can just lie to everyone she loves.

.

.

.

God, if she’d thought the constant echoings of _I love you_ were bad last week.

This week, they’re the drumbeat she marches to, the ticking of the clocks as time goes by, in every breath and every blink and every time she opens her mouth around him, its all that she can think.

And maybe she’s made the choice that her mother told her to make.

Except she hasn’t actually done anything about it, and its killing her.

And she thinks that maybe, maybe if she just gets out of Starling City then the three little words will leave her alone.

The problem is that they don’t.

They are as constant as the hum of her engine as she drives over.

_(I love you)._

The sound of her heels clicking down the hallways of STAR Labs.

_(I love you)._

So she takes the pieces of herself that she’s kept hidden ever since her mother’s words shattered her existence and her heart and her mind and her choices, and makes a makeshift wall around her, because there’s no way she can fake it for days without someone noticing that some things up unless she does.

And maybe just maybe she feels like she has something to prove.

(And it has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the last time she was in Star Labs she was under the impression that things could possibly get better with her and Oliver) (but she can’t think about that, not now, not when every heartbeat is another _I love you_ and its barely being contained by the walls of cracked porcelain she has surrounding her).

And maybe she hopes that no one will notice.

And maybe she amps it up a bit. Maybe she forces an innuendo when there’s absolutely not a necessity for one other than to mask her conflicted feelings about the choice that her heart is making without asking her mind. Maybe she hopes that no one notices.

And at first she thinks no one does.

But then she’s asking Barry if he’s okay in Jitters and it occurs to her that his eyes are asking the very same question of her.

(God, she’s missed seeing his face without it being blurred by a waterfall of mascara-stained tears).

(She’s missed her best friend). (Because talking on the phone isn’t quite the same thing).

And he’s about to tell her something, something very important, but then they’re interrupted, because Eddie walks in and apparently he knows the secret now and Barry definitely _did not_ mention that in their last call.

(She wonders what else he forgot to mention). (She wonders what else he needs to tell her that he couldn’t tell her over the phone).

(And sure, she remembers hints of something) (the _nothing seems to make sense anymore_ ’s) (the comment about being concerned that Wells was turning him into a weapon) (but he never outright said anything). (Maybe he felt like he couldn’t say anything over the phone).

And then Eddie, who she’s only ever had about three conversations with in her life, asks her how she can live her life just lying to everybody, and she almost lets out a bitter laugh because _she’s still doing it, even now. Even with the people who she’s supposed to tell everything to._

Luckily her walls went right back up as soon as she saw Eddie, and Barry must’ve noticed it too, because he looks at her a little strangely as she answers to not think of it as a lie, but more as a little fib. But its the best way she can explain it: because telling her mother that her and Ray are working on a project to help the city is true, as long as she doesn’t specify what it is. Because telling Jerry, her EA, that she’s using her work computer for non-work-related business to “help a friend” is true, to an extent. Because saying that she’s in love with Ray Palmer and a totally happy, in-pure-honeymoon-stage girlfriend is true, but only if she’s lying to herself.

Barry and Eddie look at her like maybe they miscalculated the amount of pain and suffering that a petite blonde can hold in, and she expected it of Eddie, but not of Barry, who’s seen her at her absolute lowest points.

(Maybe they don’t know each other as well as she thought they did).

(Its time that changed).

But they can’t talk about that, not now. Because Barry has to zoom off, and Felicity tells him “Bee Careful” and then “Don’t Die.” And the last one means more to both of them than it may seem to the casual observer, because they’ve had this conversation, more than once. Because she can’t lose him too. Because they are the twin pillars holding up a crumbling building, and if she loses him, everything will fall apart.

She’s already lost her father.

And Cooper.

And sort-of Oliver.

If she loses Barry too she will collapse.

And he smirks at her bad pun and tells her without words that he’s not planning to die, and then leaves her sipping her coffee in a flash, and, once again, she’s really glad she has a friend who appreciates her pun-making skills.

(Not even Ray, who should be perfect for her on paper, appreciates those quite as much as he should).

.

.

.

He tries to take Felicity’s words to heart, he really does, just like every time he’s gone into the field since their fight about being safe and staying alive, but sometimes other people come before yourself.

So he does die.

For about five seconds.

And how ironic is it that his last thought before blacking out is that Felicity is going to kill him if he survives this.

And she does. She is angry and caring and irate and gentle and terrifying and comforting all at the same time in the way that only she can be, and even though Ray’s right there, Felicity dotes on him the proper amount one should after someone comes back to life.

Barry had forgotten what it felt like to have someone who is not used to you getting into immense amounts of danger daily care about you. He’d forgotten that Felicity doesn’t realize that him having super healing doesn’t mean that he isn’t out there risking his life just as often as Oliver is.

_(I was very specific that you not die). (Yeah, thats a pretty big thing for her)._

And that’s when he realizes that maybe Ray does not know the extent of his relationship with his girlfriend. Maybe Ray doesn’t realize that its Barry that Felicity makes weekly if not bi-weekly calls to and spills her guts out too.

(Maybe Ray doesn’t know this because that would require Felicity spilling her guts to _him_ , which she is obviously not doing) (another hole in the perfect-girlfriend perfect-couple facade that Felicity seems to be trying on).

And then she jokes again about him thinking that Cisco was trying to get him killed and he looks at her and then he notices her realize that he was serious. They really need to be more specific when they talk to each other.

And he gets out of there as fast as he can (which is pretty fast). He’d never thought he’d see the day where he was actually running at top speed to get ready for a dinner that he’s fifth-wheeling, with one of his ex-somethings and her new boyfriend, and the girl he’s in love with and her boyfriend.

And then promptly regrets it, because Iris and Eddie are fighting and Ray and Felicity are playing roles that neither of them are that good at, and _when is the food coming?_

And while he loves watching passive-aggressive Iris usually, he feels like this is entirely his fault. Eddie is in amazing amounts of pain and discomfort and its all his fault. (Yet another thing). The second-hand embarrassment is nearly killing him. Every thought in Barry’s head right now is something he wishes he hadn’t thought of.

_(Hey did you guys know I’ve kissed both of your girlfriends?)._

_(Do you think Eddie and Felicity might be related?)._

_(When is the food coming?)._

_Oh thank god, its the food._

And the food turns out to be the tiniest thing Barry’s ever seen and he really needs some extra calories right now because he’s been running all day and _really? Quail egg?_

Barry doesn’t even have time to dig into his tiny piece of food when he immediately loses his appetite entirely because Ray, who Barry knows to be too good to be involved in this sort of thing, says Harrison Wells is his hero. Because it sounds so much like something Barry had said earlier and everything is so different now and he just doesn’t want _anyone else to get hurt._

He can’t even remember if he makes an excuse or not because he gets out of that room so fast.

Felicity follows soon thereafter, and she confronts him on the same thing she’d asked him about in Jitters and he wants to tell her so bad but he doesn’t want to put her in danger and its such a bad time and…

_“And don’t say its a bad time; Oliver might be joining the League of Assassins, Laurel’s the Black Canary, and Thea is training with Malcolm, so I know about bad times.”_

He’s once again forgotten that he is not the only one struggling right now. He’s once again forgotten that Felicity goes through just as much as him, if not more. He’s once again forgotten that they are identical in soul and mind and that she can practically read his mind sometimes.

(Just not enough for him to be able to keep this from her).

“Okay,” he starts, and it feels like taking a deep breath after being underwater.

And he tells her.

He has a feeling her face would be more shocked if she hadn’t gone through so many earth-shattering, mind-blowing experiences already.

She is shocked though, and scared for him, and it shows in the small quake of her voice and the quiet tremble of her cadillac red lips as she tries to do exactly the same as he did; make excuses upon excuses until the truth can no longer hide.

_I don’t know anything anymore._

Barry can practically see the vague and menacing allusions to something terrifying occurring on his end all start to make sense to her.

And he wants to tell her more, wants to include her on this because it feels so good to let out a secret when all he’s been doing is lying and deceiving and playing a part probably worse than Felicity is playing hers and...

“Hey guys.”

Ray interrupts, and while Barry slightly (barely really) approves of him for his sunshine-of-a-best-friend, he’s not willing to let him in on this little secret, because the suit’s not exactly working well enough for Barry to feel like Ray will have enough protection to keep him safe from Wells. (And maybe Caitlin) (and possibly Cisco). So he stops talking. And empathizes a little when Ray says its getting intense in there.

And then Iris sort-of breaks up with Eddie. There was a time when that would’ve made Barry so so happy, but now it just twists his guts up into knots. Another thing thats his fault.

But then he gets the message and races over to STAR Labs and hopes with all his heart that he hasn’t ruined absolutely everything. (And hopes that Felicity will drop the act a little when its just her and Ray).

.

.

.

She doesn’t see him again until after the dinner.

And they don’t get to talk then either, because everyone’s right there. And they don’t get to talk later either, because they have to deal with Mercury Labs.

So she’s more than a little frustrated.

So she texts him and tells him to meet her at Jitters, because _they need to talk._

Because she may not trust Caitlin and Cisco with the details of her love life, but she does trust them with her life, and Barry’s (especially Barry’s) and _how could he ever think that they’re working with Dr. Wells?_

So she waits on the plush chairs, almost falling asleep on her jacket.

Barry startles her when he arrives, and she barely pays attention to what he is saying to catch her up on the bees, because he looks like he’s in ten different kinds of pain, and she knows she needs a way to get rid of his pain.

(And not like _that_ ).

“Good.”

“Where is Ray?” Of course he asks about the boyfriend that she’s practically been attached to since she arrived. (Perks of pretending to be in love with someone you’re not in love with).

“Oh, he’s working on his suit with Cisco.” _(He’s not here) (its just us) (because we need to talk) (because you look like someone just ran over your dog repeatedly) (and this is the only thing I think I can do about it)._

“I like Ray; he seems like he’s a-” she hears Barry pause for a moment and she knows it's because he’s been able to see through her act from the second she introduced the two of them “really good guy.”

“He _is_ a good guy.” She replies, because she knows in her heart that its true. Like listing off the reasons why he should be perfect for her to her mother back in the hospital. “Just like Cisco. And Caitlin…. Girl.”

He looks down for a moment before answering her, and she knows its because he thinks she doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but she _does_ , and she’s about to prove it to him.

“Is that why you called me here?”

And she begins to explain. The best way she knows how: with a story of her own, a story that Barry will understand.

And she tells her own version of the _it was red_ story. And she can feel her face light up like Christmas when she says Oliver’s name.

_(I love you)._

(Really not a good time for her to be thinking that, since she’s not around Oliver or Ray at the moment, and a love confession to Barry right now would just make everything even _more_ crazy).

And it all comes down to them being good people with good hearts. Cisco. Caitlin. Oliver.

Barry seems to understand, but he’s so lost right now that she’s pretty sure he’ll listen to any guidance he can get. But he forgets that she _knows_ him, like the sun knows the moon (except, you know, she can’t actually figure out which one of them would be the moon in that equation). And sometimes, sometimes they get together and a total eclipse happens, and they cast a new light on everything for each other. Just like she’s doing now. He’s not agreeing, but she knows he’s listening, and thats all that matters.

And then they have to go and stop the girl that Ray and Cisco have officially dubbed the “Bug-Eyed Bandit” and she’s good, very good, but not as good as Felicity.

Except she’s almost better.

Except Barry almost dies. Again.

Except Ray almost dies. And Felicity’s nerves are on the Fray.

_“Stay away from Barry Allen.”_

And then she wins their hack-off.

And then Ray’s okay.

And then she feels like she can breathe again.

And then she remembers that _this_ is why she comes to Central City; because here the good guys win.

.

.

.

They say goodbye at Jitters later.

She’s wrapped around Ray’s arm again like he’s her crutch, but Barry’s okay with that because he realizes he has his coping mechanisms and she has hers and he actually kind of likes Ray.

Ray’s the kind of guy who brings Felicity coffee.

Barry’s down with any guy who brings Felicity coffee.

(Mostly because he’s pretty sure if he cut open her veins he would find cappuccino there and not blood).

Ray’s also the kind of guy who takes home the bees that almost tried to kill him as a souvenir. Just wacko enough for Barry to not understand him, but just sane enough for Barry to like him.

He’s not totally sure that’s a good idea, but doesn’t let Ray know that, because he doesn’t want them to have come all the way to Central City for nothing.

Felicity checks up on him one last time.

“Are you okay?”

“Mmhmmm.” He answers. “I’m gonna be.” (Thanks to her). “Thank you for your advice.”

And he means it, because he doesn’t know what he’d do without her, and while she makes it clear to him often that she couldn’t live if he died, she has no idea what it would do to him if she was no longer a part of his world.

“I won’t even charge you the five cents.” She teases, and he knows its an inside joke, from the time she made him marathon all the Peanuts movies with her, but can’t bring himself to laugh, because her eyes aren’t joking, they’re all _be careful_ and _you can trust me with anything_ and _your secret’s safe with me_ all at the same time.

He pretends he’s not on the verge of crying in thanks as he smiles at her and then at Ray. And then its time for the goodbyes. The one they always have.

“Bye, Felicity.”

The smile is pained and forced and he doesn’t want her to go but goodbyes always come and if things are really as bad as she said they were in Starling then she really needs to get back.

“Bye, Barry.”

Her smile is forced too, just like the tightness of her arm around Ray’s waist as they exit Jitters together, and Barry watches her ponytail sway as she goes.

He gets a text later saying _Love ya._ and grins, because she somehow still makes him smile, even when miles away.

.

.

. 

_(I love you_ ).

So yeah, Central City did not help one bit.

_(I love you)._

But at least Ray’s suit is working.

_(I love you)._

And at least she got one of these I love you’s out before she exploded.

_(I love you)._

Because there’s no way she’s saying it to Ray.

_(I love you)._

Which is probably a good thing because he just took his back.

_(I love you)._

And she’s not sure whether or not to feel offended or relieved.

_(I love you)._ (Okay, this has to stop).

The only thing is, it doesn’t stop. It only seems to get worse. Especially when Roy is in jail and she never told him she loved him (platonically, of course). Especially when Ray and Oliver are in the same room and she can barely think straight with all their declarations echoing around her. Especially when Dig is giving her nervous glances every moment because they’re both scared that Roy’s plan won’t work.

But then Oliver’s yelling at Dig and storming out and she can’t have him go out there by himself because _she can’t lose him_ and also she’s part of a plan to get Roy out safe and clear Oliver’s name. So she follows him out, running as fast as she can in the white pair of heels she’s wearing.

And she deflects his statements with the armor that is her new coat.

And she parries his argument with the sword of common sense.

And by then the _I love you_ ’s are coming as fast as her heartbeat, which is racing, because she just ran after him.

And maybe its just because she was right when something more was going on with Barry than what it seemed at the surface that she tells Oliver there’s something more going on with him.

And maybe Janus is staring at her in the face, and maybe the god has been (metaphorically, of course, because she only believes in one God) since Central City, because she has been a bit of a hypocrite lately.

And maybe she understands now that Oliver didn’t give up his love for her, but rather sacrificed it and she knows it sounds the same but it means something different in her head.

And maybe she lets him know that she understands.

When he tells her a man cannot live by two names, its with a bitter smile. When she hears it, it cuts a bitter saw through her heart.

“Right now I can’t live by either; so I don’t know who I am.”

He _doesn’t know_ and that’s painful, because its the second time she’s heard that this week, first with Barry and then with Oliver and she can’t give people answers she doesn’t have because, as smart as she is, she doesn’t always have all the answers.

But she knows this.

_(I know two things)._

“I know who you are,” she starts, her mouth moving faster than she can process just like it always is when she’s giving him advice, because she’s speaking from her heart, not her head. “Whether you’re in… in a suit, or under a hood, you’re the man that I-”

_(I love you)._

She can see him catch his breath and she catches hers because this is not the right time for this, not here not now, not when she’s with Ray and Oliver’s still closed off. Not when there’s a chance he could leave her again. Once again, the three little words are masters of bad timing.

Luckily, she stops herself before she creates a train wreck.

“You’re the man that I believe in.”

_(And I believe in you)._

And it hurts to say it, oh it hurts, and she’s already on the edge of tears and has to gulp her emotions down because they’re threatening to overthrow her mind and consume her body and tell him she loves him and this isn’t a good idea, nope, not at all.

She watches him resign himself to the fact that she didn’t say it.

(And they both know what _it_ was).

She resigns herself to the fact that she didn’t say it.

And so she does the one thing she always has to do nowadays when she gets over-consumed by her emotions; she brings up Ray, because his name is kind of a moodkiller.

And he wants to go with her.

“It is adorable how you keep forgetting that Lance is after you, but, uh, its a quick errand, and you need practice in letting people help you.”

She can’t get off the street fast enough.

And more happens after that, much more, but that’s not what she thinks about when she thinks about calling Barry and telling him about her day, because he has enough on his plate already, as she mentioned to Team Arrow earlier. All she thinks about telling him is about the almost _I love you_ , because he could use some good news that doesn’t involve jail or metahumans or deaths or the fact that Ray’s giving her break-up eyes in the car ride home from saying goodbye to Roy.

She doesn’t tell him any of that though, because crisis strikes in the form of a demon.

The head of a demon, to be exact.


	12. Scheherazade

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laurel Lance calls him at approximately one in the morning, and he races over to find his best friend not broken, but absolutely destroyed. She says Oliver didn't have any happy stories, but finds her friends reminding her that often stories can be made happy by an excellent storyteller. (Post Flash 1x19 and Arrow 3x20)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how are you guys feeling? because i am ABSOLUTELY WRECKED. i thought at the beginning of this week that barry and felicity were the only flashxarrow pairing that i truly cared about but then came Laurel and Cisco who melted my heart and i started shipping them like super hardcore, so there's like one or two references to that in here (but don't worry, its not the main focus point). And, of course, 3x20 also destroyed me, as you can see by the absolute pile of angst below.  
> (so in other words i'm thinking of writing a sister fic to this fic that centers around laurel and cisco but won't update weekly because two weekly fics is just too much for me right now)  
> {also thank you to honorthedeadbyfighting on tumblr for beta'ing this week's fic and hopefully more to come}

Scheherazade

_{refers to a person who is an excellent storyteller and able to keep the audience in suspense} {from Arabian Nights (The Thousand and One Nights): a folktale in which a king marries a new wife every day and then executes her because his first wife died and he wants no woman to ever be happy again. When Scheherazade marries him, she tells him a new story every night and they always end too soon. This is how she stays alive for 1,001 nights, and by that time, the king has fallen in love with her} {And the King, hearing these words, and being restless, was pleased with the idea of listening to the story; and thus, on the first night of the thousand and one, Shahrazád commenced her recitations.}_

 

Laurel Lance calls him at approximately one in the morning.

For a second, Barry wonders if it’s because she wants to talk to Cisco about the Canary Cry and forgot to get his number when he was in Starling.

But then he picks up and hears her shaky voice and the sobs coming from the background and he immediately knows something’s wrong and his heart stops beating because _please no not Felicity not when he just saw her a few days ago no not this anything but this no._

Because as much as she reiterates that she cannot lose him, he can’t lose her either. If the world would ever the spark of light that was Felicity Smoak, he’s not sure how anyone could ever smile or have hope or love afterwards.

“It’s Felicity,” she says and he almost collapses back on the bed.

“What happened?” He rushes out, panicked and his stomach feels sick and everything feels wrong and his head hurts.

Laurel is silent for a second, and it’s too long of a second, and Barry wishes he could speed up time instead of slow it down and in another time he might’ve asked Doctor Wells for help with this but he can’t now because they know absolutely truly now that Wells is the man in yellow so he just sits and waits in agony until she answers him.

“I think maybe it’d be best if she told you.”

And that's good. That means she’s safe. She’s alive. She’s breathing. She can tell him what happened herself.

“I’ll be right over.” He says.

And he is.

(But the run over feels like it takes hours) (but he is worried out of his mind) (but he cannot even fathom what would be so terrible that it would prompt Laurel to call him this late at night but so not earth-shattering that Felicity would be fine enough for her to tell him herself).

(He’s so distracted that he forgets to put on his Flash suit before racing over, so most of his clothes are smoking, and his shoes are actually on fire and he thinks he might have received second-degree friction burns but none of that matters because she’s sitting in Laurel Lance’s office curled up in a ball shaking from crying).

And she’s there. Alive. And breathing (despite it being more close to hyperventilating than breathing). (But breathing, nevertheless). And he sighs a sigh of relief.

But then she looks up.

And her face is barren of makeup for the first time in the entire time he’s known her and her black and white dress is slightly crooked and he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her look like this. She looks absolutely destroyed.

(Not broken) (broken means bottles of wine and chocolate ice cream and screaming about how unfair the world is) (broken is red and fire and Felicity still being the light of everyone around her’s light despite the fact that that light is now being cast by a fire and not by the sun) (broken means warm whispers into his neck). (Broken means she can piece herself back together) (broken means he can help her piece herself back together). (But she doesn’t look broken, she looks destroyed).

He’s never seen her destroyed before.

And this doesn’t look like the Felicity he knows, the one who sat across from him just days ago with full, curly hair in a vibrant red dress and lit up the entire room when she talked about Oliver.

And thats when it hits him.

_(Oliver might be joining the League of Assassins)._

And he might not know exactly what that means or why that would mean she is hurting so much but he knows that must be it because the flash of hurt in her eyes when she’d told them that matches the absolute devastation pouring from her blue irises now except multiplied by one thousand (maybe more).

She pulls herself together a bit when she sees him. Shaking hands coming up to try and wipe away the tears that are falling down her face like waterfalls. Trying desperately to get to her feet but her legs look like they’re about to give up on her any second and she’s stumbling like a baby giraffe in the high high heels she’s wearing that he knows were just another attempt at armor that is clearly doing nothing against the arsenal of feelings she’s just been attacked with.

“Barry?” She asks, voice quiet and cracking and shivering and _devastating._

“Laurel called me.” He responds, and they both turn to look at the woman in the pantsuit who looks like she might break by just staring at the blonde hurricane that has swept into her life.

“I thought you could use as many friends as you could get.” Laurel offers in explanation with a shrug of her shoulders that looks like its trying to convey nonchalantness but her caring eyes and quivering lip tell a different story.

Felicity nods and then tries to take a step towards Barry and almost falls but he quickly catches her, and then they’re hugging and she’s sobbing again and then Laurel’s arms are around the both of them too and Barry’s only had about five conversations with her in his life, but he can’t think of anyone else he’d rather be by Felicity’s side at this moment.

(Well thats a lie) (he can think of one person) (and if he could go grab them right now and bring them here just to stop Felicity’s tears he would do it) (but he can’t). (First of all because he has no idea _where_ the League of Assassins is). (Second of all because he’s not in any shape to be taking on a _League of Assassins_ ).

.

.

.

Her glasses are sitting on the floor somewhere. They must’ve fallen off somewhere in the sobbing and shaking and it was only when she tried to wipe her tears away that she noticed the blurry vision wasn’t only from the water dripping from her eyelashes.

And now she’s surrounded by the body heat of two of her best friends and it’s comforting, as much as it can be right now. And she’s stopped shaking a bit, because she’s been craving human contact ever since she left Nanda Parbat.

(Laying on Dig’s shoulder in the plane didn’t help that) (neither did his hugs) (but maybe thats because not enough time had passed for the incubation period of grief to end). (But now its helping) (as much as it can).

The body heat is significantly added to by the fact that Barry’s flannel shirt may or may not be smoking. She steps back for a moment when she realizes this.

“You’re smoking.” She manages, and suddenly it seems like the funniest thing in the world, which probably isn’t a good sign. And it’s funny because it’s normal. As normal as things get for them. It reminds her of a time when the largest thing she had to worry about was whether or not Ray was going to be okay with her taking a few days off to go see Barry in Central City. And now nothing is normal. But Barry’s shirt still apparently thinks it is. His shirt still apparently thinks that the world is not ending and shattering into a gazillion pieces. That everything did not change so astoundingly in the past forty-eight hours that nothing will ever be the same again.

And she laughs.

And the obvious concern on Barry and Laurel’s faces grows intensely, because this definitely _should not_ be funny. Because she is definitely going insane now. She must be. That’s got to be the only way she can cope with this because she may have just lost him forever.

And then she remembers the last time her glasses were off and she was surrounded by human contact and that was a road she should not have gone down because everything is so irreparably different now.

And Barry’s shirt does not seem to realize that.

Barry quickly pats out the shirt and the sparks quickly fade, as does the smoke, but her bitter and insane amusement does not.

Well, it stays, but then the laughter goes from insane to bitter to her just hyperventilating again to tears.

“He always said he didn’t have any happy stories.”

The idea is so ridiculous, but it’s true. (And she’d thought for some brief moment of insanity that maybe she would be his happy story) (but obviously that’s not true now) (because what kind of happy story ends like this?)

It’s Laurel’s noise of sympathy that makes her realize she just said all of that out loud. And with anyone else (except Dig and Roy) she might be embarrassed, but they both have gotten to know her so well in the short time that her friendships with them have burned so bright, and she knows they won’t mock her or make her feel like she should take back any of this.

(It’s why she came to Laurel in the first place)

(It’s probably why Laurel called Barry).

“Oliver’s ridiculous.” Laurel finally says. “This isn’t the end. And even if it was, he has _plenty_ of happy stories, and _plenty_ of them involve you. All you need is a good storyteller.”

If the bluntness was coming from anyone else, it might hurt Felicity more, but she knows her friend is just looking out for her (and she knows she’s right). And she may not be able to stop the tears from flowing, but she can let her friends take care of her.

So she does.

“You’re right. You’re both right. This _can’t_ be the end.” Felicity takes a deep breath as she pulls away from the two of them. “And I’m sure I can dig up some happy stories from _somewhere_ if you get some alcohol in me.”

Barry cracks a smile for the first time since he entered the room. “I have some too.”

“I think I have some too if you both don’t mind hearing about him during college.”

They don’t. And they agree to meet at Verdant in fifteen minutes.

.

.

.

Felicity’s still very much devastated at this point, looking like all the color has been drained from her life, and Laurel’s arguing with the bartender about whether or not Thea Queen would approve of the fact that their non-alcoholic drinks are more expensive than their alcoholic ones, so Barry goes first.

He covers Felicity’s still-shaking hands with his own. “I’m going to let you in on a secret.” He starts, “I’m going to tell you who won.”

And her eyes light up a bit with the spark of curiosity, and that’s all he’s wanted since he laid eyes on her in the fetal-position in Laurel’s office.

And he tells her the story of two friends and playful competition and the way Oliver’s arrows can move so much slower than him but seem to almost always find their mark, no matter how fast he’s going - _its like he has that one bow Robin Hood has in Once Upon A Time_ \- and what made them decide to finally call it quits. And he tells her who won. Just like he promised. (Well, he’s going to, but then Laurel comes back with drinks, even though Felicity is clearly the only one getting drunk tonight since she seems to have picked out a non-alcoholic beverage for herself and Barry literally _can’t_ , and they get a bit distracted and Felicity never really finds out who won but thats okay because she’s stopped shaking).

Laurel goes next. Telling the story of the first time she met Oliver Queen and Tommy Merlyn at some _stupid_ party and all about how he was trying so hard to play up the act but she saw right through him, both of them, and all about how sometimes, when he wants people to get to know him as more than a stranger or acquaintance or a one-night stand, he doesn’t wear as much of a mask.

Barry notices Felicity nodding at this point. He remembers the story she’d told him of how she’d known he was a good person with a good heart. He remembers how, when they’d talked on the rooftop, when Oliver had gotten over his _stupid_ jealousy (because really, Felicity was so smitten with Oliver that Barry wasn’t even an option) Oliver had shown him the side that could laugh and help and inspire, had shown him the hero that Barry had been so desperately craving when he’d first come to Starling City.

She still doesn’t talk. And she’s blaming it on not being drunk enough, but Barry thinks maybe she’s scared if she starts talking about Oliver she’ll never stop.

So they start telling other stories, first of Oliver and then of anything else. And Laurel tells them about meeting Cisco. And Barry tells them about his escapades with Caitlin this week. And Laurel talks about working with Thea all those years ago. And Barry tells them about how he’s inexplicably found a friendship with Eddie. And they trade off with the stories, and Felicity stops shaking. And then she stops crying.

And then she tells a story.

And its quite a beautiful one.

.

.

.

She opens her mouth to make one comment. A comment that is totaly unrelated to the story she ends up telling. A comment about Cisco probably falling in love with Laurel now that he’s met her, but somehow the words she’s been planning out for five minutes straight get stuck at the back of her throat and instead she tells the story of a boy and a girl in a world where everything still makes sense and she knows he’ll always come to rescue her and they share a bottle of wine that was promised long ago and he opens it by shooting an arrow into the cap.

Instead she tells the story of whispered words in ears when surrounded by red velvet and satin and a thousand candles. Instead she tells the story of a laptop full of bulletholes and a red pen and Shakespeare references that are lost on him. Instead she tells the story of how a girl who thought she would never mean anything significant to anyone again ended up falling in love with someone who would never love her back in a universe that made sense, but who somehow ended up with a friend and a partner and now a _something_ (because lover was too creepy of a word and boyfriend was too normal for this and she didn’t want to start spewing out love-of-her life like she was some crazy teenager).

They both stare at her when she finishes, with their eyes wide open and she thinks, if she squints a little, she can see a pearly tear creeping in the corner of Laurel’s eye and she’s sure its not because she actually thinks that Felicity’s overwhelming love for Oliver is beautiful, so it must be some other reason.

Barry’s the first one to comment.

“Wow… Felicity…”

“You ever think about writing a book?” Laurel juts in when Barry finds himself at a loss for words.

“What?” She responds, tilting her head to the side a bit, because she’s definitely drunk but she’s not drunk enough to be mishearing things but _that_ definitely sounded like something she misheard.

“You’re an excellent storyteller.”

“A regular _Scheherazade_.” Barry offers, and Laurel gives both of them a confused look, but Felicity gets the reference, oh god does she get the reference, and it fits, somehow.

Because Scheherazade was loved by a ruler of all who was supposed to have lost the ability to love. Because Scheherazade somehow drew the light out of the king in a way that neither of them had felt possible. Because, despite how things looked on the outside, neither of them ever really intended to fall in love with each other.

Because he was supposed to be in love with his first love, but that all fell to pieces and he thought he would never love again.

Because she became closer to him through the skills taught to her by her father, who she never saw again.

“If you two are going to do that twin-brain thing around me, you’re going to have to explain it.” Laurel teases, but she’s smiling.

Felicity looks towards Barry, because he’s always been so much better with remembering the historical and mythological stuff than her, but he just smiles a soft smile and tells her, “How about you tell this story.”

And she does.

And the storytelling continues, and the trading off resumes, and the happy stories overflow from their table and fill the club with a warm kind of buzz, or maybe thats just the alcohol.

And Felicity’s not okay.

But she’s happy for now.


	13. Mentor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They forgot their phone call this week. Maybe that's why Barry is so surprised to see Oliver Queen at STAR Labs in full League of Assassins regalia. Maybe that's why Felicity's so surprised to see Barry as she dies. There's a lot of time between the beginning and the end, and this is the story of some of it. {speculation for 1x22 and 3x23}

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry there was no allusions last week; I was on vacation and felt both episodes left on too large cliffhangers to have a barry/felicity chat in between. On the upside, BARRY IS COMING TO ARROW NEXT WEEK AND OLIVER IS COMING TO THE FLASH AND ALL THE CROSSOVER GOODNESS.  
> also, I apologize for this chapter being so late (well only by ten or so hours) it probably won’t happen again (especially since the last chapter is next week, but don’t worry, i’ll probably be doing one for them for season four, and, if you really need your barricity quota filled, the barricity season 3/1 rewrite is going on this summer so be excited for that).   
> everything this chapter is pure speculation and canon-divergence so be warned

Mentor

_{a trusted counselor or guide} {from Mentor, a friend of Odysseus' son, who was entrusted with his education} {"' **Mentor** , grievously though we may miss my father_

_why go on as if that homecoming could happen?'" The Odyssey, Book 3, lines 258-9}_

 

So things are different now. Really different. Like really really different now that Iris knows he’s the Flash. And he thinks he may like it better hearing her voice in his ear. And she’s still mad at him a bit, and they still can’t find Eddie, but it’s all kind of okay because now Barry has _hope_. It’s basically unfounded, impossible, improbable thoughtless hope, but it’s there anyway because of a few words she told him on a rooftop at night, and that’s a feeling he hasn’t felt for those reasons in a while.

And everything is looking like it’s going so uphill, because he swears he’s on the cusp of finding Eddie and Wells-who-isn’t-really-Wells, that he doesn’t even realize Felicity hasn’t called him this week.

He probably should’ve.

He probably should’ve realized long before Oliver Queen, dressed in all black with a silk hood around his newly-shaven face, appeared from the shadows of STAR Labs, making him jump and Cisco drop his cherry lollipop and Caitlin squeal and Iris let out a small scream.

He probably should’ve told Iris about who the Arrow was, but it must’ve slipped his mind in this whole crazy chaotic situation that she’s gotten herself into now, and maybe he should’ve mentioned it before because her hand is over her heart and she looks like she might pass out a little.

“Barry?” She asks, timidly and tentatively. “Is that Oliver Queen?”

“Oliver Queen is dead.” The figure in black responds. “I am Al-Sahim.”

_Al Sahim._ Gideon’s voice announces over the intercom system. The AI somehow attached itself to their comms system after Dr. Wells left, and its stubborn refusal to let go has resulted in this happening on many occasion. Barry wonders if it’s done anything weird to the space-time continuum, since technically he’s only able to get this sort of help because he’s going to build Gideon in the future. _Arabic for ‘the Arrow.’ Or perhaps you were referring to Sahim Alwan, who was arrested and charged as part of the War on Terror in 2002._

And Oliver may have just said that Oliver Queen is dead, but the expression on his face when Gideon starts talking proves to Barry that Oliver Queen is very much alive, although he may not be trying that hard to play the part of his new league role when he’s around Team Flash.

“Arrow?” Iris’ voice comes from the corner, where Barry had all but forgotten about her, distracted by the arrival of his friend. “As In _the_ Arrow? As in Oliver Queen is the Arrow and not Roy Harper who was just killed in prison in Starling City for _being_ the Arrow?” Her voice is a bit high and her breathing a bit forced and it gets more so when Oliver whips around, quick as can be to aim an arrow at her throat because he obviously didn’t see her when he came in.

“Oh yeah…” Barry runs his hands through his hair. “Iris knows now. I guess Felicity didn’t… well, couldn’t tell you that.”

At the sound of Felicity’s name he can see Oliver’s harsh gaze soften a bit, and he is so glad that Oliver, despite being away for the past month, hasn’t forgotten all about Barry’s blonde best friend.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Iris regains her voice and waves her hands in the air, as if attempting to fan the scene in front of her into making sense. “So you know Oliver Queen was the _Arrow_ and  didn’t _tell me_?”

Barry decides to borrow a line from Felicity: “It wasn’t my secret to tell.”

“And Felicity knew too? Next thing you’ll tell me is that Ray Palmer was that guy flying around the city like Iron Man last month.”

“ _Actually.._.”

“ _Barry!_ ”

Oliver clears his throat and proceeds in a voice somehow more gravely than the one that Barry fondly remembers as his _Arrow voice._ “You can discuss secret identities later. Right now I need Caitlin and Cisco’s help.” He turns to the two of them, Caitlin observing the scene wryfully and Cisco attempting to take a picture of Oliver in his League of Assassins gear. “The two of you engineered a cure for Mirakuru. Do you think you could make one for the Alpha/Omega virus?”

_Alpha/Omega virus. A super-virus created by BTHK Biotech in Hong Kong when the project to create a super antibiotic went wrong. Killed millions in Hong Kong in 2010 but was covered up by ARGUS and HIVE. This virus also attacked Starling City in 2015, but eventually a cure was created by Caitlin Snow and Cisco Ramon, also  known as…_

“What _is_ that thing?” Oliver asks, cutting Gideon off.

“An Artificial Intelligence created by Barry in the future and brought to the past by Dr. Wells who’s actually not Dr. Wells and actually from the future.” Cisco supplies helpfully. “So yes, according to Gideon, we can.”

“How soon?”

“You’re asking us to backwards-engineer a cure for a deadly disease without the help of Dr. Wells. How long do you think that it’s going to take?” Caitlin asks a bit skeptically. “It took us _weeks_ with the Mirakuru, and that was when we had Dr. Wells helping us.”

“Can’t you just ask that _thing_ for the recipe?” Oliver growls, and Barry can tell he’s getting impatient, “Starling City will be under attack by the virus in less than twenty-four hours.”

_The cure for the Alpha-Omega virus contains…_

“Oh _hell_ no.” Cisco starts. “We’ve messed enough with the space-time continuum for one day. If things get really bad, we will try asking Gideon for help, but for now, Caitlin and I can get working.”

“If you’re not too busy with League stuff while we’re waiting for the cure,” Barry starts, “we really could use your help here.”

“I’m afraid I have one more favor to ask of you first.” Oliver tells him with sad eyes, as Barry solemnly listens to his friend’s proposal and tries not to smile a bit every time Iris hears a part of the story she has no idea of knowing.

.

.

.

Felicity is dying.

And what a way to go, too.

Breathing in a poisonous disease set for her by the man she loves who is no longer forever lost to her but may as well be because he’s marrying someone else as she’s dying. (Ha, it’s too bitterly painful to not be kind of ironically funny). Surrounded by the people she loves. Well, most of them anyway.

Diggle.

Laurel.

Ray.

And… is that? _Barry?_

It can’t be. (She knows that) (knows it’s definitely just her overactive mind trying to cling to her pillar one last time before she drowns in the abyss of death) (knows he’s miles and miles away in Central City dealing with his own things). (She forgot to call him this week) (maybe that’s why she’s dying) (that would be a really sucky reason to be dying). (It is a real sucky way to be dying). But it is, somehow. And somehow her head no longer hurts quite as much and somehow she’s breathing again, coughing and rasping for air like she’s just been drowned.

(And she supposes she has) (dry-drowned at least).

That begs the question, _how are they alive?_

Ray’s the one to voice it, and Malcolm reveals that this was his plan all along and while it makes Felicity’s blood boil and her heart pound with anger, it also makes her breathe in a sigh of relief because that would’ve been quite possibly the worst way to go.

Slowly, they all sit up and begin to regain control of their limbs and knowledge of their surroundings, and then, there he is. Barry Allen smirks at them from behind the bars of their cage, in full Flash regalia with a _missed me?_ sort of look in his eyes and beyond that an impossible-to-hide relief that they all are alive. A relief Felicity knows is echoed in her own eyes. Still, that begs the question…

“How are you here? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I am beyond happy to see you. Actually, beyond happy that I can see anything, but aren’t you supposed to be in Central City, you know, dealing with _stuff?”_

(She doesn’t voice what _stuff_ actually is) (being one of the two people in the room who actually know what she’s referring to) (but the implication hangs in the air that _stuff_ is a lot more serious than Felicity is making it out to be) (that _stuff_ is something more important than Barry saving his friends from the psycho-leader of the League of Assassins).

Barry rubs the back of his neck in his trademark gesture of awkwardness, and Felicity once again feels a rush of sentiment that she has the chance to see her beyond-awkward best friend again. “Yeah… I do, but when Oliver told me what was going on, I knew I had to help.”

Felicity doesn’t have to look at John to know that his eyes darken at the mention of Oliver’s name, and really, she can’t totally blame him; Oliver and Malcolm keep going behind their backs, making them nothing more than unwilling actors as a show they are not directing and have no say in continuously unfolds around them. Hell, even _Barry_ seems to know more about this plan than she does.

(Although, he might have told her if they had had their weekly chat like they were supposed to) (he’s never been that good at hiding things from her) (they know each other too well for that).

“Well, if you’re not…” she starts tentatively, not wanting to ask more of him when he’s already given them so much already, “we could really use your help on this whole thing.”

Barry looks slightly panicked at the thought (well actually a lot _more_ than slightly panicked), and, despite Felicity giving him the look she always gives him when she wants something from it, he still tries to back out. “I’m sure Oliver’s got this.”

And it might seem true, if about seven League members don’t enter the room less than five seconds after Barry utters these words. The team hastily tries to make their way to their feet and into fighting positions, but, by the time they get there, their attackers are tied to the column in the center of the room by a series of chains, their weapons scattered.

Barry skitters to a stop, and, even in their dazed state, Felicity can tell the rest of the team is impressed. It would’ve taken them at least half an hour to take down these attackers, even if more hadn’t come, alerted by the noise, and that’s _with_ Laurel’s Canary Cry and Ray’s supersuit in tact, which they are not at the moment.

Felicity had forgotten that Malcolm and Laurel hadn’t witnessed Barry in action before, so when she turns to everyone, she finds a series of slack jaws. (Diggle’s always been a little wigged out by the Flash, so his mouth is hanging open, albeit not quite as wide as that of his companions) (Malcolm looks like he’s trying to hide his amazement with a smirk that speaks of possible intrigue, and Felicity takes a not to try and keep his filthy hands off of Barry Allen at all costs) (Laurel’s eyes are full of wonder, and at first Felicity thinks it’s because she’s seeing Barry for the first time, but then she notices the other woman’s eyes raking Barry’s body and is overcome by a sisterly sort of protectiveness only to realize that Laurel’s checking out the suit, not Barry himself) (maybe she’s gotten closer to Cisco in the past few weeks than Felicity realized) (especially if she’s able to pinpoint his handiwork that quickly). (Ray is the only one who seems unfazed, but then again he didn’t seem fazed when she told him about the League of Assassins either, so at this point she thinks nothing fazes him).

And then Barry leads them to the room where the League has stored all their weapons for the time being, and, as Felicity watches her friends put on all of their armor and re-load their guns and Laurel asks Ray if he can temporarily fix her Canary Cry for the time being, she motions to him for them to talk outside.

Immediately, she wraps him up in a big hug that she didn’t know she needed and he holds her, just for a minute, as she lets out the tears she’d been holding back in front of the team.

“I thought I was gonna die in there, Barry. I thought I _had_ died.”

He doesn’t say anything in response, just pulls her closer, and Felicity thinks that one of these days she’s going to be the one comforting him. Surely his life is as messed up as hers, right?

Barry chuckles at that.

“I said that out loud, didn’t I?”

“Maybe a little bit.”

.

.

.

A lot happens in between then and the end. A lot of important things and a lot of not-so important things. And the end for her isn’t the end for him, because there’s a lot more to come.

But for now. At the end of the beginning and the beginning of a new chapter, they sit across from each other in the Jitters of Starling City, a porsche parked outside, sparkling a bit in the sunlight. Felicity has her hair down, and it glows a bit in the afternoon light, creating a sort-of-halo around her head.

“And so then, we get out and everything is fine and Ray comes up to me and I ask him _shouldn’t you be at PT?_ _Because, you know, you’re the CEO and everything_. And he turns to me with the same expression on his face he had when he first showed me the suit, like he was about to make all my dreams come true, and says _actually,_ you’re _the CEO and everything now._ And then he has the _gall_ to just take a sip of his coffee, as if he didn’t just deliver life-changing news to me.”

Felicity’s rambling on about the story of how and why she has this shiny new car to him, and he’s trying to listen to her, he really is, but all he can think about is how it’s been so long since it’s been just the two of them like this. How long it’s been when there hasn’t been any life-threatening disaster to pull them away from each other or make them focus on anything but spending time with each other. He nods along anyway, though, enjoying the sound of her voice and her company and the sun streaming through the window next to them.

“So I say something along the lines of _wait… what?_ and he explains to me that those papers he had me sign earlier were the rights to Palmer Tech and all this stuff about how he’s moving out of Starling because ‘ _there are too many vigilantes here already_ ’ or something like that, and I asked him about his late fiancee, you know, the whole reason for this whole Atom project in general and he told me he’s still doing it for her but now he’s doing it for me too and that I have a board meeting in a week with Wayne Enterprises and… why are you looking at me like that?”

“No reason. I just really love you.”

Her eyes widen a bit at the statement and he finds himself trying to explain to her because they’ve always walked this thin line between platonic and romantic and he hopes he hasn’t severed it with those words, because that’s not what he really meant at all. “I don’t mean it like _that_ , obviously. You know, because you love Oliver and I love Iris and all that, but I do love you. Like… the way Athena loved Odysseus, or the way Mercutio loved Romeo. I don’t know, Felicity. I just can’t figure out of any way else to say it.”

“Don’t worry.” She replies quickly, smoothing over the wrinkles in his words as if they’re one of her many polka-dotted skirts, “I get it. Although,” her tone suddenly becomes teasing, “I don’t think Athena and Odysseus ever kissed.”

“I don’t know…” He teases back. “She seemed pretty smitten with him. I mean, she basically traipsed around Greece as a mortal for at least a week just to help him. As a mortal man, no less.”

“Please. If anything he was smitten with her. Why else do you think he was so quick to hook up with Circe and Calypso? He just wanted to get his mind off of the virgin goddess he was in love with.”

“One word: Mentor.”

“So what you’re implying is that when we met _I_ was the one smitten with you and not the other way around?”

“Definitely.”

“Please, Mr. _he’ll be on time, you_ were the one in love with _me_.”

“One word: _Sold._ ”

And they’re joking and laughing about the whole debacle because they know that then, like now, they were hopelessly in love with other people, who at the time seemed unattainable, now… (now the only proof anyone needs to see that things aren’t so unattainable are the fact that both of their phones have started buzzing with texts from said unattainables wondering when they’re coming home).

“Well, Barry Allen, I am very glad to have been your Mentor.”

“And I am very glad to have been your Odysseus.”

“Your Peggy Carter.”

“Your Jarvis.”

“Your Shawn.”

“Your Gus.”

“Your Donna Noble.”

“Your Ten.”

Felicity’s phone rings again.

“Okay, I really have to take this or we might get some arrows in the window of my new porsche, and that would be a pity because he doesn’t know about it yet.”

“You going to let him drive?”

“Only if he plays nice.” She picks up her not-yet-finished coffee and her purse smiling as she stands up from the table to give him a goodbye hug. “Good luck with everything in Central City.”

“I’m going to need it.”

He hugs her then.

“Bye, Barry.”

“Bye, Felicity.”


	14. Let the Cat Out of the Bag

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felicity Smoak and Barry Allen are hopelessly in love.  
> Just not with each other.  
> They would probably not be as happy as they are right now if they were in love with each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to the very last chapter of allusions. I know there’s still one more Flash episode yet, but, seeing as it is probably going to end with the Flashpoint Paradox or some other cliffhanger of equal magnitude, and especially seeing as Felicity is currently driving down the coast of California to some other place, I thought it would be best to end here. I know, it’s sad. Fear not, however, because there will be a sequel to this for season 2/4. Happy reading and thank you to all of you for sticking with this fic for so long.  
> Also, this is late because I didn’t want it to end. I love this fic and it’s followers and Barry and Felicity so much that I wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye yet. Maybe I am now.

Let the Cat Out of the Bag

_{refers to a secret being revealed} {in medieval times, farmers would take pigs to market in a bag, sometimes they would put a cat in the bag instead of a pig. if the bag was opened, the secret would be revealed, but often buyers would not look in the mag to make sure}_

 

Wells wants a fight.

(Well actually his name is Eobard, Eobard Thawne, and, as trippy as that is, it’s probably important for Barry to remember that the real Dr. Wells died long long ago).

And Barry is prepared to give it to him.

Because he’s angry, god, he’s so so angry. He’s angry that Cold betrayed him, angry that the other metas escaped. Angry that he has been trying so so hard to do everything all by himself without any help and failing miserably. Angry that, even when he did reach out for help, he got nothing.

Barry feels alone.

And angry.

So he goes down there by himself against everyone else’s wishes. Goes down there because he feels like he has something to prove. Goes down there because everything is falling to pieces around him and he needs to put a stop to it.

But, as it turns out, he doesn’t have to face the Reverse Flash alone.

Because Ronnie drops from the sky, and Barry would shout his name in relief if Caitlin wasn’t already doing it over the comms.

And then Oliver does. Oliver, who hasn’t been answering any of Barry’s calls or texts. Oliver, who Felicity had told him was the Heir to the Demon now. Oliver, who Lyla had said was in Nanda Parbat. Oliver, who isn’t supposed to be here ( _shouldn’t_ be here) but is anyway. Oliver, who came through for Barry when he thought he had no one else.

(And yes, he knows that his view of the Arrow may be a little biased) (knows that Joe is right that he shouldn’t be trying to emulate him) (knows that there is light and dark in the world and that Oliver is made of too much dark and not enough light) (but he can’t help it) (because it is, in Cisco’s words, just _so freaking awesome_ ).

And they all take down Wells together. Ready, Aim, and Fire all together, with help from Ray Palmer’s formula, and, for the first time all week, Barry feels like he’s winning.

“I need a favor.” Oliver asks of him when it’s all done.

“Whenever, wherever.” Is Barry’s only response, and it’s true, because he owes his friend this. Owes him everything and anything. Whenever. Wherever.

As it turns out, whenever is right now and wherever is Nanda Parbat. Because Felicity is dying (but not really) and Barry needs to get her and Ray and the others out of there as fast as he can. So he runs fast as he can to where she is. Where they all are. And he gets there just in time.

Well, just in time to see Felicity Smoak wake up and take a breath.

.

.

.

The first breath is painful, excruciatingly so, and she is reminded of the time she almost drowned as a child. The coughs hurt as well, but she needs them like she needs the air around her because if she doesn’t get them, she’s going to die. (She’s already died once today and it’s not an experience she’d like to repeat).

Then Malcolm breathes.

Then Ray.

Then Diggle and Laurel and Felicity is still trying to wrap her brain around how they’re not dead, because _they should be dead_.

“Not that I’m complaining, but shouldn’t we be dead?”

Her thoughts exactly.

(Well not really, because her thoughts keep circling back to one thought and short circuit beyond that and she can’t seem to comprehend anything other than)

“Oliver tried to kill us.”

Malcolm offers a half-baked explanation but Felicity ignores him because her brain still can’t get beyond that fact and she is lost in a cloud of smoke and despair and poison filling her lungs. And she’s hoping that the coughing and the breathing will clear a path through the fog in her mind but they don’t, they just drown out the sound of her teammates arguing around her.

She clears her throat, but it doesn’t clear her thoughts, but she begins to speak anyway because she needs to reason out what has happened, needs to apply logic to a situation so illogical that it has her brain short-circuiting.

“Okay, assuming this is all some part of a brilliant double-double-cross, or triple-cross; I’m losing count, your master plan still has one major flaw since we’re _still chained in a dungeon_.”

Merlyn tries to patronize her but she doesn’t hear it because all of a sudden a rumbling noise fills the room, like the sound of lightning storm.

And then she sees him. And then the fog clears. Because he is her pillar and she is no longer falling through a clouded mist.

“You guys have a hot tub? Nice.”

Felicity faintly hears a comment made from the end of the hall and then he’s there and in her face, smiling like the giant nerd he is and she could not be more happy to see him.

“Hey, guys.” She scrambles to her feet, barely believing her eyes. “Wow, I mean, this is like a _real_ dungeon.”

“ _Barry!_ ” She calls out, a smile filling her face and threatening to consume her.

“Thank you, Felicity,” he replies, shooting a glance at Merlyn, “you just outed my secret identity to a supervillain.”

(It’s the night of tears and broken bottles and Agent Carter that she whispers those words to him once) (in a question as to why Oliver would ever consider working with a literal _supervillain_ ) (a question she still doesn’t have an answer to) (she’s broken down in his lap and his hands are in her blonde hair, fingers curling strands of it with uncertainty when they leave her lips and she’s sure he hasn’t heard her, sure he doesn’t care) (but yet here he is, remembering them) (and saying them in such a teasing and lighthearted way that she is once again so grateful to have him) (once again she wonders what she would do without him).

“No offense.” He adds as an afterthought, and then proceeds to _phase through a wall._

(He’d told her about this power the night Ray got shot) (in hushed tones because she was in the hospital and he was being careful not to let anyone know he was onto Wells) (and she’d thought about it, knew it existed, but never like _this_ ). (Truth be told, she’s impressed).

And then he gets them out.

And gets a bear hug. Because Felicity’s like that.

They walk into the room where the League has stored their weapons with hands and shoulders brushing because they both need to feel, need to know, that the other one’s there and alive. (Mostly Felicity, but Barry just almost lost her too). It’s a bit difficult because both of them can’t really fit through the narrow archway at once, but they make do, because she’s not letting go of him until she has to.

And then they know it’s goodbye. And she doesn’t want it to be, she really doesn’t want it to be, because she’s honestly terrified, but she’s less so with him by her side, and tears begin to fill her eyes as she begs him to stay and help. “And not to be greedy, but we could really use your help on this whole Starling City supervirus thing.”

He can’t watch her almost tear up without getting a little misty himself, but he has to go, knows he has to, and he tells her that too, trying as hard as he can to put all the emotions of an unspoken goodbye into his words. “You know I would, but I am overdue for a _very_ pointed conversation with Harrison Wells.”

He can’t look at her anymore, can’t watch the way the hope falls from her eyes, so he turns to the rest of his friends (and Merlyn). “I’m sure Oliver’s got this.”

They try and explain to him why Oliver certainly _doesn’t,_ but all Felicity can do is hold her grey backpack tightly to her chest in a desperate effort to keep herself together.

But then Barry mentions he’s seen Oliver recently, _spoken_ to him, and Felicity’s hearts soars because _maybe he’s not all dead inside yet._

“Good luck.” Barry tells her before speeding off and she realizes it’s the first time they’ve said goodbye without their usual sign off.

It feels wrong and unfinished.

Like the ending of Mockingjay felt unfinished.

She swears on her life that she’ll see him again.

.

.

.

Felicity Smoak and Barry Allen are hopelessly in love.

Just not with each other.

They would probably not be as happy as they are right now if they were in love with each other.

(If they were in love with each other, Felicity wouldn’t have regained the love of her life).

(If they were in love with each other, Barry wouldn’t know that Iris feels the same about him).

(If they were in love with each other, Felicity wouldn’t have given Oliver something to fight for, to live for, and Starling City may have permanently lost it’s hero).

(If they were in love with each other, Barry wouldn’t know that he marries the love of his life).

(If they were in love with each other, Oliver wouldn’t have chosen Felicity over the Arrow and they wouldn’t be off on a road trip together).

(If they were in love with each other, Iris and Eddie wouldn’t have broken up).

Yet, sometimes they both still wish they had fallen in love with each other.

Moments like this one when Felicity is lying on her stomach on the bed in the room of the Route 66 hotel that she’s staying at illegally livestreaming the new Avengers movie with Barry. (Because, despite the great distance between them at the moment, they’re allowing themselves to have a normal friendship, one that doesn’t involve rescuing each other from almost-death and instead involves geeking out over stuff with each other) (the friendship they should’ve had in the first place) (the friendship they deserve).

“You know, we really should’ve seen this for the first time together.”

“Please, you don’t actually think that. I know for a fact that you saw it with Iris.”

“Yeah, but you’re the only one besides Cisco who really understands when I start freaking out about this sort of stuff.”

“I am honored to fill that role. To be fair, however, this is _my_ first time actually seeing it.”

“Only because you and Oliver were making out in the back of the theater like teenagers instead of actually watching the movie.”

Felicity only blushes a little bit. “I am so regretting telling you that. Okay, I’m starting the stream again. We are _finishing_ this one.”

So they watch. And they finish. (Albeit with pauses in between for rants on both parts about the things they like and the things they don’t) (with pauses for jokes and bathroom breaks and when Barry goes to get the pizza he ordered). And it is only when they do that they are interrupted.

Oliver opens the door of Felicity’s hotel room just as Iris calls “Bar?”

They both turn to look at each other for a moment before their screens are filled with sights of the other couple (even though Barry and Iris are not actually a couple yet, but Felicity’s sure they’ll get there eventually) (after all, it’s what the future dictates).

“Sorry Barry, I’m taking my girlfriend back; we have dinner reservations at eight.”

Felicity gives him a slightly apologetic look, but he knows she doesn’t really mean it, because she’s obviously excited for these dinner reservations, even though he’s pretty sure these two have eaten every meal together for the past six days.

“Good.” Iris replies for him, coming into the room and then into frame. “Because I believe _you_ swore you were going to shatter my bowling record once and for all.”

“Bye, Barry.” Felicity hums happily.

“Bye, Felicity.” Barry replies, equally as happy.

And they don’t have to pretend that they love each other, because they do, just not in the same way that they love the two people who have called them away from their computers. In any other universe they might’ve acted on the fact that they are perfectly perfect for each other, but love isn’t about which puzzle pieces fit together, it’s about who makes you feel like your heart is running a marathon, it’s about who makes your skin feel like it’s on fire with just one touch.

And, as Oliver helps Felicity up from the bed and into his arms with a kiss while Iris takes Barry’s hand and pulls him out the door, both of them feel those feelings. So yeah, might as well let the cat out of the bag: they’re hopelessly in love, and they’re stupidly happy because of it.

**Author's Note:**

> so yeah this was supposed to be a drabble but then the words just kept coming and i ended up with this.  
> if you have any other suggestions for scenes that go with allusions to other works of literature or film, let me know in a comment and i'll see if i can get to it :)


End file.
